Li Bai and Keith Holyoak
From the Chinese of Li Bai (701-762 AD)
Listening to a Sichuan Monk Playing His Lute
A Sichuan monk
cradling his lute, descending
Ermei peak
on the west as evening fell,
With a single stroke
of his hand made pines resound
through thousands of cliffs,
and opened a gushing well
That cleansed the wanderer's
heart in a crystalline stream
while the chords lingered,
blending with the temple bell -
I was unaware
how the green mountain had darkened,
how autumn clouds
piled high like an ocean swell.
A CD of twenty-three of Keith Holyoak's English versions from Li Bai, with music by Cheun-Fung Wong on the chin, is now available from Broken Electric (www.brokenelectric.com)
Translated by Keith Holyoak
Page(s) 26
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