More Translations from the Chinese/The Spring River

by Bai Juyi

[39] THE SPRING RIVER

[A.D. 820]

Heat and cold, dusk and dawn have crowded one upon the other;
Suddenly I find it is two years since I came to Chung-chou.
Through my closed doors I hear nothing but the morning and evening drum;
From my upper windows all I see is the ships that come and go.^[1]
In vain the orioles tempt me with their song to stray beneath the flowering trees;
In vain the grasses lure me by their colour to sit beside the pond.
There is one thing and one alone I never tire of watching—
The spring river as it trickles over the stones and babbles past the rocks.

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1. "The Emperor Saga of Japan [reigned A.D. 810-23] one day quoted to his Minister, Ono no Takamura, the couplet:
   

   'Through my closed doors I hear nothing but the morning and evening drum;
   From my upper windows in the distance I see ships that come and go.'

   Takamura, thinking these were the Emperor's own verses, said: 'If I may venture to criticize an august composition, I would suggest that the phrase "in the distance" be altered.' The Emperor was delighted, for he had purposely changed 'all I see' to 'in the distance I see.' At that time there was only one copy of Po Chü-i's poems in Japan and the Emperor, to whom it belonged, had allowed no one to see it."—From the Kōdanshō [twelfth century].