My old friend takes off from the Yellow Crane Tower,
In smoke-flower third month down to Yangchou.
A lone sail, a distant shade, lost in the blue horizon.
Only the long Yangtze is seen flowing into the sky.
translated by Wai-lim Yip
saying farewell
On Yellow-Crane Tower, Farewell to Meng Hao-jan Who’s Leaving for Yang-chou by Li Po
From Yellow-Crane Tower, my old friend leaves the west.
Downstream to Yang-chou, late spring a haze of blossoms,
distant glints of lone sail vanish into emerald-green air:
nothing left but a river flowing on the borders of heaven.
translated by David Hinton
Farewell to a Friend by Hsüeh T’ao
The water country’s reeds and rushes, night, covered with frost;
The moon’s coldness, the mountains’ cast share a bleak, pale blue.
Who can say, from this night on, a thousand li away,
My dreams of you, dim as the distant frontier?
translated by Eric W. Johnson
Leonard Durso 