Selected Poems
Li Bo (701-762 C.E.)
Composed ca. 716-762 C.E.
China
Li Bo is regarded as China’s greatest poet, along with Du Fu. His name is also spelled Li Bai, Li Po, and Li Pai. His courtesy name is Taibai and his literary name is Qinglian Jushi. There are about a thousand extant poems by Li Bo, and many of them are written in older poetic forms, less regulated than those developed during the the Tang dynasty (618-907 C.E.). Also unorthodox is his incorporation of colloquial language and folk songs into his poetry. Importantly, Li Bo’s poetic world expresses Daoist views, emphasizing “the (Daoist) Way” and celebrating a free and wandering life. Buddhism (especially Chan Buddhism) is also essential to understanding Li Bo’s poems. On a side note, he is well known for his love of alcohol and wrote many poems about drinking. A popular legend says that Li Bo drowned because he was sitting drunk in a boat and was trying to seize the moon’s reflection in the water.
Written by Kyounghye Kwon
Selections from The Poet Li Po A.D. 701-760
Bai Li, Translated by Arthur Waley
License: Public Domain
FIGHTING
Last year we were fighting at the source of the San-kan;
This year we are fighting at the Onion River road.
We have washed our swords in the surf of Indian seas;
We have pastured our horses among the snows of T’ien Shan.
Three armies have grown gray and old,
Fighting ten thousand leagues away from home.
The Huns have no trade but battle and carnage;
They have no pastures or ploughlands,
But only wastes where white bones lie among yellow sands.
Where the house of Ch’in built the great wall that was to keep away the Tartars,
There, in its turn, the house of Han lit beacons of war.
The beacons are always alight; fighting and marching never stop.
Men die in the field, slashing sword to sword;
The horses of the conquered neigh piteously to Heaven.
Crows and hawks peck for human guts,
Carry them in their beaks and hang them on the branches of withered trees.
Captains and soldiers are smeared on the bushes and grass;
The General schemed in vain.
Know therefore that the sword is a cursèd thing
Which the wise man uses only if he must.
THE SUN
O Sun that rose in the eastern corner of Earth,
Looking as though you came from under the ground,
When you crossed the sky and entered the deep sea,
Where did you stable your six dragon-steeds?
Now and of old your journeys have never ceased: Strong were that man’s limbs
Who could run beside you on your travels to and fro.
The grass does not refuse
To flourish in the spring wind;
The leaves are not angry
At falling through the autumn sky.
Who with whip or spur
Can urge the feet of Time?
The things of the world flourish and decay,
Each at its own hour.
Hsi-ho, Hsi-ho,
Is it true that once you loitered in the West
While Lu Yang raised his spear, to hold
The progress of your light;
Then plunged and sank in the turmoil of the sea?
Rebels against Heaven, slanderers of Fate;
Many defy the Way.
But I will put | the Whole Lump | of Life in my bag,
And merge my being in the Primal Element.
THE WHITE RIVER AT NAN-YANG
Wading at dawn the White River’s source,
Severed a while from the common ways of men,
To islands tinged with the colours of Paradise,
Where the river sky drowns in limpid space.
While my eyes were watching the clouds that travel to the sea.
My heart was idle as the fish that swim in the stream.
With long singing I put the sun to rest:
Riding the moon, came back to my fields and home.
GOING DOWN CHUNG-NAN MOUNTAIN AND SPENDING THE NIGHT DRINKING WITH THE HERMIT TOU-SSŬ
At dusk we left the blue mountain-head;
The mountain-moon followed our homeward steps.
We looked round: the path by which we had come
Was a dark cleft across the shoulder of the hill.
Hand in hand we reached the walls of the farm;
A young boy opened the wicker-gate.
Through green bamboos a deep road ran
Where dark creepers brushed our coats as we passed.
We were glad at last to come to a place of rest,
With wine enough to drink together to our fill,
Long I sang to the tune of the Pine-tree Wind;
When the song was over, the River-stars were few.
I was drunk and you happy at my side;
Till mingled joy drove the World from our hearts.
DRINKING ALONE BY MOONLIGHT
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.
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.
Since Heaven and Earth both love wine,
I can love wine, without shame before God.
Clear wine was once called “a Saint;”
Thick wine was once called “a Sage.”
Of Saint and Sage I have long quaffed deep,
What need for me to study spirits and hsien?
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.
IN THE MOUNTAINS ON A SUMMER DAY
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.
DRINKING TOGETHER IN THE MOUNTAINS
Two men drinking together where mountain flowers grow:
One cup, one cup, and again one cup.
“Now I am drunk and would like to sleep: so please go away.
Come back to-morrow, if you feel inclined, and bring your harp with you.”
CLEARING UP AT DAWN
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 fragments of cloud
Blown by the wind slowly scatter away.