You ask why I live
in these green mountains

I smile
can’t answer

I am completely at peace

a peach blossom
sails past
on the current

there are worlds
beyond this one

translated by David Young

Whose jade-flute is this, notes flying invisibly
Scatter into spring winds, filling City of Loyang?
Hearing the “Break-a-Willow-Twig” tonight,
Who can withhold the surge of thoughts of home?

ytranslated by Wai-lim Yip

I would cross the Yellow River, but ice chokes the ferry;
I would climb the T’ai-hang Mountain, but the sky is blind with snow. . .
I would sit and poise a fishing-pole, lazy by a brook–
But I suddely dream of riding a boat, sailing for the sun. . .
Journeying is hard,
Journeying is hard.
There are many turnings–
Which am I to follow?. . .
I will mount a long wind some day and break the heavy waves
And set my cloudy sail straight and bridge the deep, deep sea.

translated by Witter Bynner & Kiang Kang-hu

Li Po on board, ready to push off,
suddenly heard the tramping and singing on the bank.
Peach  Flower Pool a thousand feet deep
is shallower than the love of Wang Lun who sees me off.

translated by Burton Watson

It’s been so long since I headed for East Mountain—
how many times have the roses bloomed?
White clouds have scattered themselves away—
and this bright moon—whose house is it setting on?

translated by Burton Watson

The garden’s desert, crumbling walls, as willows green again.
Even the sweet song of spring’s a lament.
Nothing of what was, but the moon above the river,
moon that shone on a pretty face in the palace of the king of Wu.

translated by J.P. Seaton