Li Po (701-762)
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| Also known as Li Bo, Li Bai is one of the most
celebrated poets of the golden age of Chinese poetry. He lived in
the first half of the 8th century, during the T’ang
Dynasty. It is difficult to separate legend and myth from the
actual history of Li Po’s life. Yet poetry was practiced and
celebrated among the nobility in China.
In-depth knowledge of this art form and its history was a prerequisite for the educated. Poetry was equated with "chi", the source of human energy and balance that also forms the basis of the ancient Chinese method of medicine called acupuncture. At 19 Lo Po’s is said to have left home to live with a Taoist recluse. His writing reflect Taoist influences, in both its reflective and contemplative tone as well with its close connection, if not preoccupation, with nature. Raised in Szechwan province in western China, Li Po traveled extensively in the eastern and central regions. The emperor Hsuan-tsung (Xuan Zong reigned AD 712-756) recognized Li Po appointed him to a post in the famous Hanlin Academy that Hsuan-tsung was forming. Li Po was obviously a poet of the Chinese imperial court. Legend has it that caught up in political intrigue, he was forced from the emperor’s court and traveled much of China. Through several exiles, imprisonments and pardons, Li Po seems to always be swept up in the political winds of the moment, much more like a politician than a poet. The poetry of Li Po is a characterization of classical Chinese poetry. It is marked by simplicity and a preoccupation with the personal and mundane aspects of a poet’s life. The patterns of nature repeat and the poet’s emotions range from joy to despair. Yet the work seems to speak with quiet grace and contemplative restraint That lulls and charms the reader. A legend surrounding his death says that while drunk a boat, the poet, Li Po drowned attempting to embrace the reflected moonlight on the water. The legend while charming and fitting obviously sprang from poems that contain the dangerous mix of both wine and moonlight. |
So bright a gleam on the foot of my bed --
Could there have been a frost already?
Lifting myself to look, I found that it was moonlight.
Sinking back again, I thought suddenly of home.
Drinking Alone with the Moon
From a pot of wine among the flowers
I drank alone. There was no one with me --
Till raising my cup, I ask the bright moon
To bring me my shadow and make us three.
Alas, the moon was unable to drink
And my shadow tagged me vacantly;
But still for a while I had these friends
To cheer me through the end of spring....
I sang. The moon encouraged me
I danced. My shadow tumbled after.
As long as I knew, we were born companions.
And then I was drunk, and we lost one another.
.... Shall goodwill ever be secure?
I watch the long road of the River of Stars.
The Hard Road
Pure wine costs, for the golden cup, ten thousand coppers a flagon,
And a jade plate of dainty food calls for million coins.
I fling aside my food-sticks and cup, I cannot eat nor drink...
I pull out my dagger, I peer four ways in vain.
I would cross the Yellow River, but ice chokes the ferry;
I would climb the Tai-hang Mountains, but the sky is blind with snow.
I would sit and poise a fishing-pole, lazy by a brook --
But I suddenly dream of riding a boat, sailing for the sun...
Journeying is hard,
Journeying is hard.
There are many Turing’s --
Which am I to follow?
I will mount a long wind some day and break the heavy waves
And set my cloudy sail straight and bridge the deep, deep sea.
Bringing in the Wine
See how the Yellow River's water moves out of heaven.
Entering the ocean, never to return.
See how lovely locks in bright mirrors in high chambers,
Though silken-black at morning, have changed by night to snow.
... Oh, let a man of spirit venture where he pleases
And never tip his golden cup empty towards the moon!
Since heaven gave the talent, let it be employed!
Spin a thousand of pieces of silver, all of them come back!
Cook a sheep, kill a cow, whet the appetite,
And make me, of three hundred bowls, one long drink!
... To the old master, Tsen,
And the young scholar, Tan-chiu,
Bring in the wine!
Let your cups never rest!
Let me sing you a song!
Let your ears attend!
What are bell and drum, rare dishes and treasure?
Let me be forever drunk and never come to reason!
Sober men of olden days and sages are forgotten,
And only the great drinkers are famous for all time.
... Prince Chen paid at a banquet in the Palace of Perfection
Ten thousand coins for a cask of wine, with many a laugh and quip.
Why say, my host, that your money is gone?
Go and buy wine and we'll drink it together!
My flower-dappled horse,
My furs worth a thousand,
Hand them to the boy to exchange for good wine,
And we'll drown away the woes of ten thousand generations!
Parting at a Wine-shop in Nan-king
A wind, bringing willow-cotton, sweetens the shop,
And a girl from Wu, pouring wine, urges me to share it.
With my comrades of the city who are here to see me off;
And as each of them drains his cup, I say to him in parting,
Oh, go and ask this river running to the east
If it can travel farther than a friend's love!
Tzu-yeh Song
Chang-an -- one slip of moon;
in ten thousand houses, the sound of fulling mallets.
Autumn winds keep on blowing,
all things make me think of Jade Pass!
When will they put down the barbarians
and my good man come home from his far campaign?
Spring Night in Lo-yang Hearing a Flute
In what house, the jade flute that sends these dark notes drifting,
scattering on the spring wind that fills Lo-yang?
Tonight if we should hear the willow-breaking song,
who could help but long for the gardens of home?
On Climbing in Nan-king to the Terrace of Phoenixes
Phoenixes that play here once, so that the place was
named for them,
Have abandoned it now to this desolated river;
The paths of Wu Palace are crooked with weeds;
The garments of Chin are ancient dust.
...Like this green horizon halving the Three Peaks,
Like this Island of White Egrets dividing the river,
A cloud has risen between the Light of Heaven and me,
To hide his city from my melancholy heart.
Bidding A Friend Farewell at Jingmen Ferry
Sailing far off from Jingmen Ferry,
Soon you will be with people in the south,
Where the mountains end and the plains begin
And the river winds through wilderness....
The moon is lifted like a mirror,
Sea-clouds gleam like palaces,
And the water has brought you a touch of home
To draw your boat three hundred miles.
A Sigh From a Staircase of Jade
Her jade-white staircase is cold with dew;
Her silk soles are wet, she lingered there so long....
Behind her closed casement, why is she still waiting,
Watching through its crystal pane the glow of the autumn moon?
The Moon at the Fortified Pass
The bright moon lifts from the Mountain of Heaven
In an infinite haze of cloud and sea,
And the wind, that has come a thousand miles,
Beats at the Jade Pass battlements....
China marches its men down Baideng Road
While Tartar troops peer across blue waters of the bay....
And since not one battle famous in history
Sent all its fighters back again,
The soldiers turn round, looking toward the border,
And think of home, with wistful eyes,
And of those tonight in the upper chambers
Who toss and sigh and cannot rest.
A Song of Lu Mountain to Censor Lu Xuzhou
I am the madman of the Chu country
Who sang a mad song disputing Confucius.
...Holding in my hand a staff of green jade,
I have crossed, since morning at the Yellow Crane Terrace,
All five Holy Mountains, without a thought of distance,
According to the one constant habit of my life.
Lu Mountain stands beside the Southern Dipper
In clouds reaching silken like a nine-panelled screen,
With its shadows in a crystal lake deepening the green water.
The Golden Gate opens into two mountain-ranges.
A silver stream is hanging down to three stone bridges
Within sight of the mighty Tripod Falls.
Ledges of cliff and winding trails lead to blue sky
And a flush of cloud in the morning sun,
Whence no flight of birds could be blown into Wu.
...I climb to the top. I survey the whole world.
I see the long river that runs beyond return,
Yellow clouds that winds have driven hundreds of miles
And a snow-peak whitely circled by the swirl of a ninefold stream.
And so I am singing a song of Lu Mountain,
A song that is born of the breath of Lu Mountain.
...Where the Stone Mirror makes the heart's purity purer
And green moss has buried the footsteps of Xie,
I have eaten the immortal pellet and, rid of the world's troubles,
Before the lute's third playing have achieved my element.
Far away I watch the angels riding coloured clouds
Toward heaven's Jade City, with hibiscus in their hands.
And so, when I have traversed the nine sections of the world,
I will follow Saint Luao up the Great Purity.
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