East winds hush and sigh, and delicate spring rains arrive:
out beyond the lotus pond, there’s the whisper of thunder:

the golden moon-toad gnaws a lock open: incense drifts in:
jade tiger circles back, pulling silk rope to draw well-water:

the secret love of Lady Chia and young Han led to marriage,
and the Lo River goddess shared her bed with a Wei prince:

don’t hope for spring passion that rivals all those blossoms
burgeoning forth: an inch of longing’s just an inch of ash.

translated by David Hinton

It’s so hard to be together, and so hard to part: a tender
east wind is powerless: the hundred blossoms crumble:

the heart-thread doesn’t end until the silkworm’s dead,
and tears don’t dry until the candle’s burnt into ash:

she grieves, seeing white hair in her morning mirror,
and chanting at night, she feels the chill of moonlight:

exquiste Paradise Mountain–it isn’t so very far away,
and that azure bird can show us the way back anytime.

translated by David Hinton

The pellucid road winds back around into twilight clouds:
a seven-scented carriage, cry of a dappled horse cut short:

spring wind offers itself everywhere, opens into enticing
smiles that leave a country’s ten thousand homes in ruins.

translated by David Hinton

Idle sleep in a small pavilion clears away the ease of wine:
mountain pomegranate and sea cypress, branches tangled

together on a rippling-water bed-mat, pillows of amber:
and nearby, a fallen hairpin, a pair of kingfisher feathers.

translated by David Hinton

If we trust the true and sure words written on Indian leaves
We will hear all past and future in one stroke of the temple bell.

translated by A.C. Graham

Leaves and flowers are never rated the same:
Flowers put into pots of gold, leaves turn to dust.
Still there are the green foliage and the red blooms.
Folded, stretched out, open or closed: all naturally beautiful.
These flowers, these leaves, long mirror each other’s glory:
When their greens pale, their reds fade–it’s more than one can bear.

translated by Eugene Eoyang & Irving Y. Lo