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Po Chu-I - 772 -- 846 C.E.
Poem of the Week
5 Poems
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HARD TIMES
Watch morning rise into heaven
And evening suns sinking into earth
And you don’t notice it in the bright
mirror: but here I am, suddenly 34.
Don’t say this body of mine isn’t old.
It’s getting there slowly, bit by bit,
and if white hair hasn’t grown in yet,
that young face has begun giving way.
However long this life may endure,
I’ll never be more than a visitor here:
though we’re promised seventy years,
not one or two in ten lives them out,
so why always on my way somewhere
and always finding myself nowhere
near awakened? This inch-wide heart
is a treasure-hoard of boundless ch-i.
It’s true poverty is a wretched thing,
but mastering Tao you abide in Tao,
and it’s true wealth is a joyous thing,
but if it comes it comes when it will.
Whatever brings deep wisdom to mind,
it’s here in these things nowhere else:
just sip a nice wine, and by day’s end,
a little drunk, you’re perfectly happy.
These words bear better than gold or jade.
Try them on and you’ll never lose them.
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ON MY DAUGHTER’S FIRST BIRTHDAY
Finally, after almost forty years of life,
I have a girl. We named her Golden-Bells,
and it’s been a year since she was born.
Saying nothing, she studies sitting now,
but it seems I’m no sage-master at heart.
I can’t get free of this trifling affection:
I know it’s only a tangle of appearance,
but however empty, it’s bliss to see her.
I’ll worry about her dying. Spared that,
I’ll worry about finding a good husband.
All those plans to find a mountain home:
I guess they’ll wait another 15 years.
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IN SICKNESS MISSING GOLDEN BELLS
What can I do? So sick, and your life
cut so short pitching me into such grief:
it startles me from sleep. I get up and try
lamplight for comfort against these tears,
but a daughter’s an absolute tangle of love,
and without a son the sorrow’s inescapable.
After three full years of nurture and care,
a sickness barely lasting ten quick days:
such things tear at the heart long after
tears follow the last cries of grief away.
Little robes still hung on dressing racks,
the useless medicines there at your pillow,
we send you off in this deep village lane,
then watch earth fill your tiny grave over.
Don’t say you’re hardly a mile away here:
this is farewell to the very ends of heaven.
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THE GRAIN TAX
An officer came pounding on their gate
In the night, shouting, demanding taxes.
They didn’t wait for morning. Hurrying
out to their granary, candles and lamps
alight, they winnowed grain till it shone
pure as pearls: one cart, thirty bushels.
Still they worried it wasn’t fine enough,
that they’d be whipped like sorry slaves.
I once took office, a fool devoting myself
utterly, regretting my meager talents.
Paid for sitting ten years like a corpse,
I served in four different departments
and often heard old hands proclaiming
gain and loss─it all comes round again.
If your sage hearts are so sweet and true,
why not send back a little imperial grain?
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FORTY FIVE
I’ve lived through forty-five years now.
My temples half way into grizzled gray.
I’m all skin and bone and song-seized,
wine-wild and each year more abandoned
still to the inevitable unfolding of things.
Anywhere tranquil is my old home now,
and I think my thatch hut may be ready
next spring up there beside Lu Mountain.
Po Chu-I
Translation: David Hinton -- New Directions
Posted at November 12, 2005 06:26 PM