Du Fu (712-770)

Sunset
Du Fu


The cows and sheep are moving slowly down,
Each villager has shut his wicker gate.
The wind and moon disturb the clear night,
This landscape of rivers and hills is not my homeland.
A spring flows from the stones of a darkening cliff,
The autumn dew drips on the grass's roots.
My white head is within the brightness of the lamp,
What need for the flower to flourish so?

Matsuo Basho (1644-1694)

Spring passes by

again and again in layers

of blossom kimono

may you see wrinkles

come with old age

Lady Murasaki Shikibu (c.973)

Lady Murasaki Shikibu

Meeting on the path:
But I cannot clearly know
If it was he,
Because the midnight moon
In a cloud had disappeared.

Du Mu (803-852)

Mountain Travel
Du Mu

Far away on the cold mountain, a stone path slants upwards,
In the white clouds is a village, where people have their homes.
I stop the carriage, loving the maple wood in the evening,
The frosted leaves are redder than the second month's flowers.

Yang Wan-li (1127-1206)

Don’t read books…
It’s so much better
to close your eyes sit in your study
lower the curtains, sweep the floor,
burn incense.
take a walk when you feel energetic,
and when you’re tired go to sleep.

;Lao Tzu (604-531 BC)

The Emptiness of a Vessel


The Tao is (like) the emptiness of a vessel;

and in our employment of it we must be on our guard against all fulness.

How deep and unfathomable it is, as if it were the Honoured Ancestor of
all things!

We should blunt our sharp points, and unravel the complications of things;

we should attemper our brightness, and bring ourselves into agreement with the obscurity of others.

How pure and still the Tao is, as if it would ever so continue!

I do not know whose son it is. It might appear to have been before God.

Huang O (1498-1569)

To the tune “Soaring Clouds”
by Huang O (1498-1569)

You held my lotus blossom
In your lips and played with the
Pistil. We took one piece of
Magic rhinoceros horn
And could not sleep all night long.
All night the cock’s gorgeous crest
Stood erect. All night the bee
Clung trembling to the flower
Stamens. Oh my sweet perfumed
Jewel! I will allow only
My lord to possess my sacred
Lotus pond, and every night
You can make blossom in me
Flowers of fire.

Eihei Dogen Zenji (1200-1253)

Ching-ch'ing's raindrop sound
by Eihei Dogen

English version by Steven Heine
Original Language Japanese


Because the mind is free --
Listening to the rain
Dripping from the eaves,
The drops become
One with me.

Li Shang-Yin (c. 900)

"The East Wind Sighs"

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The East wind sighs, the fine rains come:

Beyond the pool of water-lilies, the noise of faint thunder.

A gold toad gnaws the lock. Open it. Burn the incense.

A tiger of jade pulls the rope. Draw from the well and escape.

Chia's daughter peeped through the screen when Han the clerk was young.

The goddess of the river left her pillow for the great Prince of Wei.

Never let your heart open with the spring flowers:

One inch of love is an inch of ashes.