– 2 –

Solitude

So long as I do not go out from here, the world takes no notice of me. I live in peace. Since exactly when? Two or three years must have passed, so long as my room is filled with the many papers my poems have blackened, and so long as my child has begun to speak!

I look with pity on my fellows, who wear out their strength running after wealth and glory. And I wonder what will be left to them when they are in the grave.

My child's smile is worth more, to me, than all the treasures of the world. And when I compose a few lines of verse, I feel a gladness that the "Emperor of the Five Rivers" never knew.

A Woman Alone

He is the strongest of warriors, the bravest and the handsomest, the one I love! But the army is marching toward the East...

I let down my hair so that the east wind may caress it.

I hate the sun, the moon, and the stars, and I love nothing but the pouring rains.

In vain I ask them to put out the fire that devours me.

I know where I can pick the flower that grants me forgetfulness. It perfumes every corner of our beautiful dwelling. But I have locked our dwelling up, for I have a passion for pain.

For if I did not suffer as I suffer, I should be far more distant from my beloved!

Destiny

A willow leaf has parted from its branch, and here it is now, floating on the face of the water.

In my heart, too, time has done its work. I have parted from a beloved I loved dearly, and here I am, awaiting my destiny in calm and stillness.

I gaze at this willow leaf — ah! the turning of the water is carrying it back to its branch!!

Feast

I took up a bottle of wine and went to drink it among the flowers and fragrant herbs. We are always three, if I count my shadow and my friend the beaming moon. And by good fortune the moon does not drink wine, and my shadow never thirsts.

When I sing, the moon listens to me in silence. And when I dance, my shadow dances with me.

At the end of every banquet the guests scatter. But I know nothing of that sorrow: when I return to my dwelling, the moon goes with me and my shadow follows me!..