Time being as short as it is, I have not had enough of it to meditate on this poem by Wang Wei to see what interested me to try my hand at it. However, the act of translation was meditation enough, I feel. The text I worked from was Gems of Classical Chinese Poetry (2000) byYuan Xingpei. I think what I like most about this poem is that in the face of crisis it allows me to enter in with the poet in wondering who else has never questioned whether some of us can hear that divine music as we ramble along the river, heading home. Ah yes, to head home after failure.
送綦毋潛
落第還鄉
王維/ Wang Wei |
To Quwu Qian heading home after
failing his civil examinations
translated by ZJC |
|
聖代無隱者，
遂令東山客，
既至金門遠，
江淮度寒食，
置酒長安道，
行當浮桂棹，
遠樹帶行客，
吾謀適不用，
英靈盡來歸，
不得顧采薇。
孰雲吾道非？
京洛縫春衣。
同心與我違；
未幾拂荊扉。
孤城當落暉。
勿謂知音稀？
|
In a ecstatic world there will be no hermits;
the wise and practical will confer together….
So you, a man of the mountains of the east,
you gave up your life of harvesting fruit
and came all this way to the Golden Gate.
But you found that devotion is futile.
… on the Day of No Fire wander the southern rivers
and in this northern city mend your traveling clothes.
I will pour you farewell wine as you venture out from the capital.
Soon I shall be left behind by my heart's friend.
You will float again toward your own thatch door
in your wooden boat made from of cinnamon-wood.
Led along by distant trees
to a dusk brilliant on a far edge of town.
…Whatever your purpose that happened to fail,
do not question that some of us can still hear divine music. |
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