Thoughts on a Quiet Night

 
Li Bai (701-762)
 
 
Before my bed the bright moon shines its light,
Perhaps the frost now covers all the ground;
I lift my head to see the shining moon,
I bow my head to see my native town.
 
 

Chinese   靜夜思 李白   床前明月光 疑是地上霜 舉頭望明月 低頭思故鄉

Pronunciation   Jìng Yè Sī Lǐ Bái

 
My dear old friend who’s parting West
Beneath the Yellow Towers;
While falling on the Yangzhou lands
Are mists and springtime flowers.
 
Your orphan boat’s a distant shade,
That sails where blue skies go;
I look upon the water tides—
Until the end they flow.
 
 
By Li Bai, tr. from the Chinese by Frank Watson
 

 
送孟浩然之廣陵 


故人西辭黃鶴樓，
煙花三月下揚州。 
孤帆遠影碧空盡，
惟見長江天際流。 
 
李 白

At home we fenced with traveling swords,
Cutting at this and that like idle lords;
The two of us, like towns around a turn,
Will drift apart as soon as I return.
 
Riding horses over the moon bridge south,
We follow the light to the road fork’s mouth;
Arriving at last at Shandong Mountain,
Memories flow like an endless fountain.
 
Blossoms scatter about this fragrant plot
As we drink until our sense is shot;
Drunk and happy, we rise with force,
But cannot climb back on the horse.
 
 

The River Chu has split the hills in two
To send the jade-brushed water east and back,
Around the two opposing hills anew
As a lonely boat sits still in a sunlit crack.
 
 
Original Chinese poem by Li Bai