Luoyang
that drinking-inn
old "Wine-Barrel" Dong
had built me
south of Tianjin Bridge
Yellow gold, white jade
bough: laughter and song,
one everlasting month
forget kings and prince
- drunk!
'mid restless sages,
come from all directions
wanderers of the vivid clouds
to meet you there
and none more welcome
Who thought it nothing
to turn peaks, churn seas,
to incline together in open admiration
with open meaning
and no shadow of umbrage.
I went to Nanhuai,
"picking cassia"
going nowhere fast
you stayed at Beiluo
dreaming backwards, thinking of it.
Then -
I couldn't bear it,
back to meet
to wander.
We wandered far to
Xiancheng
that City of Spirits
coiled in its
thirty-six-fold river
Every stream giving onto
a thousand flowers blazing,
only then at the end
of ten thousand valleys,
each hollow full
of sound,
pines,
wind.
Gold reins,
gilt saddles,
down the plain
the Taishou of Donghan
came to greet us.
The Daemon of
Ziyang,
"Purple Light,"
offered me his
jade sheng flute to play
And back at high
Canxia, began
playing that immortal music,
a brouhaha
of brooding-phoenix calls
into the long
sleeves of the
Taishou of Zhonghan
and up he rose, swaying and
started to dance
who, with his own hands
covered me with his
brocade robe
and I was drunk
and fell asleep with my head on his thigh.
And that
banquet's
thought and force, we reached ninth heaven
Star-scattered, rain-driven
over by dawn.
Flown apart, riven
by Chu Pass
seas and vastnesses,
I over the mountains, back to the old nest.
You home, back by Wei Bridge
Your father,
august and fierce,
made governor of Bingzhou,
put down the barbarians.
In the fifth month
you sent for me,
across Taihang Mountain
broke the wheels, trackless,
twisted like sheep guts
I reached Beijing,
already deep into the year,
moved, most
by weight of kindness,
made light of yellow gold.
And there -
the jade winecups
pure jade table
drunk, wearing brocade,
no thought of return.
And sometimes, bending west,
beyond the city walls,
to the Jin shrine,
ancestral waters flowing like
green and white jade.
An idling boat,
strumming the stream
to flute and drum,
etched ripples, dragon scales
emerald water grass.
The impulse comes, lead out those girls
giving in - the moment passes
how do they do it,
white poplar flowers
so like snow?
Vermilioned, they will get drunk
apt to the setting sun.
a hundred feet of clear pool
to mirror kingfisher grace
Kingfisher elegance
reflected in young moonlight
each beauty
sings her gauze robe
into dance.
Clear wind
plays their songs
away, into the void,
curves of song
twirling on their heels
after passing cloud.
This moment of joy
flies
hardly to be met again
I journeyed west,
to offer my "Long Willow" verse
North Tower's
vivid clouds
undo hope;
I returned to Dongshan
with white hair.
At the south head
of Wei Bridge
I met you one more time
we parted again
north of Can Terrace.
You ask me about parting
how bitter? How much?
At the end of spring
falling flowers
scatter and disperse
Words cannot reach the end of this
nor feelings fathom
I call the boy to kneel
and close this poem
and send you this a thousand miles, thinking.
- Li Bai [Li Po]
© 1994
Lisa Raphals