Short Poems

All through the long and dreary night
I lie awake and moan;
How desolate my chamber feels,
How weary I have grown
Of being left alone!

Although I know the gentle night
Will surely follow morn,
Yet, when I'm wakened by the sun,
Turn over, stretch and yawn —
How I detest the dawn!

When the Emperor sought guidance from wise men, from exiles,
He found no calmer wisdom than that of young Chia
And assigned him the foremost council-seat at midnight,
Yet asked him about gods, instead of about people.

The Mother of Heaven, in her window by the Jade Pool,
Hears The Yellow Bamboo Song shaking the whole earth ...
Where is Emperor Mu, with his eight horses running
Ten thousand miles a day? Why has he never come back?

I am far from the clouds of Sung Mountain, a long way from trees in Ch'in;
And I send to you a message carried by two carp:
— Absent this autumn from the Prince's garden,
There's a poet at Mao-ling sick in the rain.

How desolate my former life,
Those dismal years, ere yet
I chanced to see thee face to face;
'Twere better to forget
Those days before we met.

Our sleeves, all wet with tears, attest
That you and I agree
That to each other we'll be true,
Till Pine-tree Hill shall be
Sunk far beneath the sea.

Our courtship, that we tried to hide,
Misleading is to none;
And yet, how could the neighbours guess,
That I had yet begun
To fancy any one?

Alas! the blush upon my cheek,
Conceal it as I may,
Proclaims to all that I'm in love,
Till people smile and say —
" Where are thy thoughts to-day?"

A slip of the moon hangs over the capital;
Ten thousand washing-mallets are pounding;
And the autumn wind is blowing my heart
For ever and ever toward the Jade Pass.
Oh, when will the Tartar troops be conquered,
And my husband come back from the long campaign!