the abyss where ancient fish leap and gaunt dragons dance

[incandescens]

A nice quiet day in which very little got done.

---

To the Harp Player

On the taut silk-spun strings of high autumn
Clouds resound against the empty mountains.
Like the daughters of Shao who wept among bamboos
Or like the sad white girl who plucked the strings,
So does Li P'ing play his harp through the country,
Clean as split jade, soft as the bluebird's song,
Sad as dewdrops on lotos leaves, happy as fragrant orchids.
His song melts the ice on the twelve imperial gates.
His twenty-three strings move the heart of the purple-robed king.
Listen, from the stone-mended cliffs of Heaven that the goddess restored,
The stone broke again, the sky shuddered, autumn rains fell,
But the harper walked in a dream to teach the old goddess on the mountain
Near the abyss where ancient fish leap and gaunt dragons dance.
The unsleeping listener leaned on a cinnamon bough
And saw the feet of the dew climbing up the shivering Hare.

-- Li Ho, translated by Ho Chih-yuan

Comments

[cat-i-th-adage.livejournal.com]

Okay, that's a cool poem.

[incandescens]

Thank you! I got it from a book of translations that flemmings sent me.

[cat-i-th-adage.livejournal.com]

(You may already know this one.)

Reading an Anthology of Chinese Poems of the Sung Dynasty, I Pause To Admire the Length and Clarity of Their Titles

It seems these poets have nothing
up their ample sleeves
they turn over so many cards so early,
telling us before the first line
whether it is wet or dry,
night or day, the season the man is standing in,
even how much he has had to drink.

Maybe it is autumn and he is looking at a sparrow.
Maybe it is snowing on a town with a beautiful name.

"Viewing Peonies at the Temple of Good Fortune
on a Cloudy Afternoon" is one of Sun Tung Po's.
"Dipping Water from the River and Simmering Tea"
is another one, or just
"On a Boat, Awake at Night."

And Lu Yu takes the simple rice cake with
"In a Boat on a Summer Evening
I Heard the Cry of a Waterbird.
It Was Very Sad and Seemed To Be Saying
My Woman Is Cruel--Moved, I Wrote This Poem."

There is no iron turnstile to push against here
as with headings like "Vortex on a String,"
"The Horn of Neurosis," or whatever.
No confusingly inscribed welcome mat to puzzle over.

Instead, "I Walk Out on a Summer Morning
to the Sound of Birds and a Waterfall"
is a beaded curtain brushing over my shoulders.

And "Ten Days of Spring Rain Have Kept Me Indoors"
is a servant who shows me into the room
where a poet with a thin beard
is sitting on a mat with a jug of wine
whispering something about clouds and cold wind,
about sickness and the loss of friends.

How easy he has made it for me to enter here,
to sit down in a corner,
cross my legs like his, and listen.

-- Billy Collins

[incandescens]

I've seen that one before: I always enjoy coming across it.