J.P. Seaton

seaton

Translations of
the Chinese Masters

Contents

 

Ten Poems by Ou-yang Hsiu
  Ou-yang Hsui

Poems from "An Answering Music"
  Anonymous, Drunken Villagers
  Tu Fu, House Cricket and Song of the Bound Chickens
  Yuan Mei, Dog Days, At "Be Careful Bank," Night Thought, Talking Art, When the Clouds Come

More Poems by Yan Mei and Poems by T'ao Ch'ien
  Yuan Mei, End of the Year, Something to Ridicule
  T'ao Ch'ien, Drinking Wine XVI, After the Ancients

Poems from "Traces: Fifty Generations of Zen Poetry "
  Seng Yu, To everything there is a season
  Ling Yi, Drinking Tea with Hermit Yuan at Greenmount Pool
  Cheng Fu, Freedom's Good
  Kuan Hsiu, Chung-nan Mountain Monk, Mean Alleyways, A Hundred Sorrows, Leaving It to You
  Ching Yun, The Old Man of the Creek
  Yuan Mei, So Be It
  Ching An, Making a Fool of Myself

Poem from "World Views: New Writing About Nature"
  Kuan Hsiu, Hymn on the Way

Poems from "Getting Past Words"
  Ching An, To Show You All, on the First Morning of the Year, Facing Snow and Writing What My Heart Embraces, On the Spot Where Shih-chia Tz Sits in Meditation

 

A Web Chapbook from
The Literary Review


 J.P. Seaton

Translations of the Chinese Masters


YUAN MEI

End of the Year

On his left, stick in plum blossoms:
on his right, a water sprite,
In the middle the old fellow, shrugging
out a song.
End of the year we calculate
by light and shadow fleeting…
And he (that's me) has squandered one more year
on poetry.






Something to Ridicule

Mencius tells us that Confucius, too
like all the other men of Lu, fought for his share
of what was taken in the hunt: it was the
custom there. To keep oneself in cloisters just
to seek a name for righteousness…that
lacks a certain dignity.
But getting learning too may be
but putting make-up on.
If one's a whore at heart, he's
sure to act the part.