LI PO

A cup of wine, under the flowering trees; I drink alone, for no friend is near. Raising my cup I beckon the bright moon, For he, with my shadow, will make three men. The moon, alas, is no drinker of wine; Listless, my shadow creeps about at my side. Yet with the moon as friend and the shadow as slave I must make merry before the Spring is spent. To the songs I sing the moon flickers her beams; In the dance I weave my shadow tangles and breaks. While we were sober, three shared the fun; Now we are drunk, each goes his way. May we long share our odd, inanimate feast, And meet at last on the Cloudy River of the sky.[1]

In the third month the town of Hsien-yang Is thick-spread with a carpet of fallen flowers. Who in Spring can bear to grieve alone? Who, sober, look on sights like these? Riches and Poverty, long or short life, By the Maker of Things are portioned and disposed; But a cup of wine levels life and death And a thousand things obstinately hard to prove. When I am drunk, I lose Heaven and Earth. Motionless—I cleave to my lonely bed. At last I forget that I exist at all, And at that moment my joy is great indeed.

If High Heaven had no love for wine, There would not be a Wine Star in the sky. If Earth herself had no love for wine, There would not be a city called Wine Springs.[2] Since Heaven and Earth both love wine, I can love wine, without shame before God. Clear wine was once called a Saint;[3] Thick wine was once called “a Sage.”[3] Of Saint and Sage I have long quaffed deep, What need for me to study spirits and hsien?[4] At the third cup I penetrate the Great Way; A full gallon—Nature and I are one ... But the things I feel when wine possesses my soul I will never tell to those who are not drunk.

Gently I stir a white feather fan, With open shirt sitting in a green wood. I take off my cap and hang it on a jutting stone; A wind from the pine-trees trickles on my bare head.

“Life in the World is but a big dream; I will not spoil it by any labour or care.” So saying, I was drunk all the day, Lying helpless at the porch in front of my door. When I woke up, I blinked at the garden-lawn; A lonely bird was singing amid the flowers. I asked myself, had the day been wet or fine? The Spring wind was telling the mango-bird. Moved by its song I soon began to sigh, And as wine was there I filled my own cup. Wildly singing I waited for the moon to rise; When my song was over, all my senses had gone.

I sat drinking and did not notice the dusk, Till falling petals filled the folds of my dress. Drunken I rose and walked to the moonlit stream; The birds were gone, and men also few.

My friend is lodging high in the Eastern Range, Dearly loving the beauty of valleys and hills. At green Spring he lies in the empty woods, And is still asleep when the sun shines on high. A pine-tree wind dusts his sleeves and coat; A pebbly stream cleans his heart and ears. I envy you, who far from strife and talk Are high-propped on a pillow of blue cloud.

The fields are chill; the sparse rain has stopped; The colours of Spring teem on every side. With leaping fish the blue pond is full; With singing thrushes the green boughs droop. The flowers of the field have dabbled their powdered cheeks; The mountain grasses are bent level at the waist. By the bamboo stream the last fragment of cloud Blown by the wind slowly scatters away.