The Poem of Huizhen
A thin moon pierces the window lattice
and firefly lights appear in the jade sky.
Where the far sky begins is all silky distance.
The low trees emerge as a dark blur of green.
Dragon songs swirl through the courtyard bamboo
as phoenix songs touch parasol trees by the well.
Thin fog descends like silk gauze.
In slight wind the sound of jade rings is heard.
The Royal Mother of the West trails a dark red train.
Her maids carry cloud-shaped jade in their hands.
Deep in the night, people all are quiet.
Our meeting is like dawn, though rain is drizzling.
Pearl light shines from her decorated shoes,
flowers peek from her embroidered clothes,
her jeweled hairpin is a colored phoenix,
and her silk shawl covers a red rainbow.
She says she’s from Yao Hua Garden
and is on pilgrimage to the Jade Emperor’s palace.
Because she took a tour to Luo City
she happened to come here, east of Song family.
When I flirt with her she resists at first.
but soft feelings already secretly connect us.
When she bows her hair it seems the shadows of cicadas move.
As she walks about her jade stocking are gilded with dust.
When she turns it’s like snowflakes swirling.
On the bed we embrace through silk
and like Mandarin ducks dance with our necks twined.
Like two kinds of jade, we go well together,
though her dark eyebrows knit frequently in shyness.
Her warm red lips feel like they are melting.
I taste her breath like a fragrant orchid,
her creamy skin, her full jade flesh.
She feels strengthless, unable to move even a wrist,
though she’s so sensitive that her body tenses.
The light of her sweat is like pearls.
Her tangled hair is loose and black.
Happiness like this comes once in a thousand years.
But now we hear the fifth beat of the night drum.
We want to stay, but time is scarce,
We are so close that it is hard to stop.
Her face is sorrow
and her words promise faithfulness.
She gives me ring to remember this time,
ties a knot, to say our hearts are twined.
Her tears drop on the mirror
and around the guttering lamp insects swirl.
The dawn light comes slowly
and the rising sun starts to show.
She flies back to Luo on the back of a crane
and plays a vertical flute on Song Mountain.
My clothes are fragrant as if dyed with musk.
There are red stains still on the pillow.
Standing in front of the grass in the pond,
my thoughts are floating far away.
I hear a harp crying and complaining like a crane.
gaze at the clear River of Stars and hope to see her crane returning.
But the ocean is too broad to cross
and the sky is too high to soar above,
so like a floating cloud with nowhere to go
I walk back inside the tower.
by Yuan Zhen (779-831)
Translated by Tony Barnstone
professor of English at Whittier College.
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