Chinese 323 Home and the Return (3)

Kelley's Selection:

Li Bai/Li Po (701-762)

"Geese Fly Home"

 

Come from the east ten thousand li, this traveler.

The world's at peace: when, then, may I go home?

Heart breaks: the geese at River Town,

High, high up, fly, straight toward home.

 

(Seaton, J.P., Cryer, J., Bright Moon, Perching Bird, p. 117.)

 

Travis' Selection:

Du Fu/Tu Fu (712-770)

"Yangtse and Han"

 

By Yangtse and Han, a stranger who thinks of home,

One withered pedant between the Ch'ien and K'un.

Under as far a sky as that streak of cloud,

The moon in the endless night no more alone.

In sunset hale of heart still:

In the autumn wind, risen from sickness.

There's always a place kept for an old horse

Though it can take no more to the long road.

*Ch'ien and K'un are the symbols of the forces behind heaven and earth in the divination system of the Book of Changes. The image is of a solitary figure between sky and earth.

 

(A.C. Graham, Poems of the Late T'ang, p. 48.)

 

Valerie's Selection:

He Zhizhang/Ho Chih-chang (659-744)

"Coming Home"

 

I left home young. I return old.

Speaking as then, but with hair grown thin;

And my children, meeting me, do not know me.

They smile and say: "Stranger, where do you come from?"

 

(Three Hundred Poems of the T'ang Dynasty, p. 60.)

 

Heidi's Selection:

Xue Tao/Hsüeh T'ao (768-831)

"Another Poem for Minister Wu on Arriving at the Borderlands"

 

Pull up!

At Pull-the-Reins-Up Ridge:

cold, and colder still.

 

The fine drizzle, the gentle breezes

pierce

my liver and heart.

 

Just let me go back

to my place in town;

 

I swear I'll never even look

at landscapes

painted on screens.

 

(Larsen, tr., Brocade River Poems, p. 48)

 

Catherine's Selection:

Wen Tingyun/Wen T'ing-yün (c.811-870)

"On West River, Seeing of a Fisherman"

 

You followed Yan Guang back

toward Rouye Creek,

Where you gave your life over to

a fishing reel and caltrop oars.

In mid-autumn, mid rain on the plum trees,

you grew sad for the maple leaves;

Then, one night, your canopied boat

lodged amid the reed flowers.

When you can't see water and clouds,

things seem but a dream to you;

So you'll follow at random the misty birds

and make of them your household.

A wind rises over the white duckweed,

evening on the storied ship;

River swallows, pair by pair,

just as the rain blows aslant.

 

(Paul F. Rouzer, tr., Writing Another's Dream: the poetry of Wen Tingyun, p. 210)