Farewell to Meng Haoran

 
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

Sending Off My Cousin, Beyond the Castle by the Southern Moon

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.
 
 

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