Of satin-wood our boat is made,
Our oars of ebony;[27]
Jade pipes and gold flutes
Play at stern and prow.
A thousand gallons of red wine
We carry in the ship’s hold;
With girls on board at the waves’ will
We are glad to drift or stay.
Even the rishi[28] had to wait
For a yellow crane to ride;
But the sailor[29] whose heart had no guile
Was followed by the white gulls.
Ch’ü P’ing’s[30] prose and verse
Hang like the sun and moon;[31]
The king of Ch’u’s arbours and towers
Are only hummocks in the ground.
With my mood at its height I wield my brush
And the Five Hills quake;
When the poem is done, my laughter soars
To the Blue Isles[32] of the sky.
Riches, Honour, Triumph, Fame,
Than that _you_ should long endure,
It were likelier the stream of the River Han
Should flow to the North-West!
[27] A phrase from the Li Sao.
[28] Tou Tzŭ-an, who was carried to Heaven by a yellow crane near
Wu-ch’ang.
[29] A story from Lieh Tzu.
[30] _I.e._, Ch’ü Yüan.
[31] Practically a quotation from Ch’ü Yüan’s “Life,” by Ssŭ-ma Ch’ien.
[32] Fairyland, sometimes thought of as being in the middle of the sea,
sometimes (as here) in the sky.
XIII. 11. SENT TO THE COMMISSARY YÜAN OF CH’IAO CITY, IN MEMORY OF
FORMER EXCURSIONS
Do you remember how once at Lo-yang, Tung Tsao-ch’in built us a
wine-tower south of the T’ien-ching Bridge?
With yellow gold and tallies of white jade we bought songs and
laughter, and we were drunk month after month, with no thought of kings
and princes, though among us were the wisest and bravest within the
Four Seas, and men of high promotion.[33]
[33] Lit. “blue clouds people.”
(But with you above all my heart was at no cross-purpose.)[34] Going
round mountains and skirting lakes was as nothing to them. They poured
out their hearts and minds, and held nothing back.
[34] A phrase from Chuang Tzŭ.
Then I went off to Huai-nan to pluck the laurel-branches,[35] and you
stayed north of the Lo, sighing over thoughts and dreams.
[35] Huai-nan is associated with laurel-branches, owing to a famous
poem by the King of Huai-nan.
We could not endure separation. We sought each other out and went on
and on together, exploring the Fairy Castle.[36]
[36] Name of a mountain.
We followed the thirty-six bends of the twisting waters, and all along
the streams a thousand different flowers were in bloom. We passed
through ten thousand valleys, and in each we heard the voice of wind
among the pines.
Then the Governor of Han-tung came out to meet us, on a silver saddle
with tassels of gold that reached to the ground. And the Initiate of
Tzŭ-yang[37] summoned us, blowing on his jade _shēng_. And Sennin music
was made in the tower of Ts’an Hsia,[38] loud as the blended voices of
phœnix and roc.
[37] _I.e._, Hu Tzŭ-yang, a Taoist friend of the poet’s.
[38] Lit. “Feeding on sunset-cloud” Tower, built by Hu Tzŭ-yang.
And the Governor of Han-tung, because his long sleeves would not keep
still when the flutes called to him, rose and drunkenly danced. Then he
brought his embroidered coat and covered me with it, and I slept with
my head on his lap.
At the feast our spirits had soared to the Nine Heavens, but before
evening we were scattered like stars or rain, flying away over hills
and rivers to the frontier of Ch’u. I went back to my mountain to seek
my old nest, and you, too, went home, crossing the Wei Bridge.
Then your father, who was brave as leopard or tiger, became Governor of
Ping-chou[39] and put down the rebel bands. And in the fifth month he
sent for me. I crossed the T’ai-hang Mountains; and though it was hard
going on the Sheep’s Gut Hills, I paid no heed to broken wheels.
[39] _I.e._, T’ai-yüan Fu.
When at last, far on into Winter, I got to the Northern Capital,[40] I
was moved to see how much you cared for my reception and how little you
cared for the cost--amber cups and fine foods on a blue jade dish. You
made me drunk and satisfied. I had no thought of returning.
[40] _I.e._, T’ai-yüan Fu.
Sometimes we went out towards the western corner of the City, to where
waters like green jade flow round the temple of Shu Yü.[41] We launched
our boat and sported on the stream, while flutes and drums sounded. The
little waves were like dragon-scales, and the sedge-leaves were pale
green. When it was our mood, we took girls with us and gave ourselves
to the moments that passed, forgetting that it would soon be over, like
willow-flowers or snow. Rouged faces, flushed with drink, looked well
in the sunset. Clear water a hundred feet deep reflected the faces
of the singers--singing-girls delicate and graceful in the light of
the young moon. And the girls sang again and again to make the gauze
dresses dance. The clear wind blew the songs away into the empty sky:
the sound coiled in the air like moving clouds in flight.
[41] A brother of Prince Ch’ēng, of the Chou dynasty.
The pleasures of those times shall never again be met with. I went West
to offer up a Ballad of Tall Willows,[42] but got no promotion at the
Northern Gate and, white-headed, went back to the Eastern Hills.
[42] Yang Hsiung, died A.D. 18, having lived all his life in obscurity,
obtained promotion in his old age by a poem of this title.
Once we met at the Southern end of Wei Bridge, but scattered again to
the north of the Tso Terrace.
And if you ask me how many are my regrets at this parting, I will tell
you they come from me thick as the flowers that fall at Spring’s end.
But I cannot tell you all I feel; I could not even if I went on talking
for ever. So I call in the boy and make him kneel here and tie this up,
and send it to you, a remembrance, from a thousand miles away.