Back To The Tang Dynasty (Wang Mingyun) Poem by Denis Mair

by Wang Mingyun
(translated by Denis Mair)

I cannot go on living here
When you are gone,
I will return to the Tang dynasty
To while away hours heating unfiltered wine
Write lopsided verses, send off birds from nearby nests
Now and then climb to an overlook
Get a view of where my loved ones live

First go visit Song Zhiwen
Gone into exile, bed-ridden most of the time
Friends of the past seldom came to his door
His only moon viewing was in an oyster shell
I won't show up bringing socialist grass
I won't bring him any seed-starts of capitalism
My two hands will be empty
My two eyes brimming

Then I will go visit Chen Zi'ang
Behind him he saw no ancients, ahead no successors
This man cut off from others
High in a tower he felt it all the more
But the Pandan orchids and Pollia he planted
Were greenery from a Sanskrit scripture
His courtyard was filled with blooms
Dew fell alike on his flowers and firm backbone

I also want to visit Old He,
I mean He Zhizhang, who served as premier but was demoted
To commoner at age 86
He never took a train or plane
Went home alone, leaning on a staff
Growing old was easy; all those doings of officialdom
Passed like mist before his eyes
He stayed by a lake, made it his mirror
In spring the wind combed his silver hair

What of Jia Dao? His shadow no longer falls
On that rough-hewn door where he knocked or pushed [1]
But a stone seat remains, on which grows moss from his time
A few cranes under tall pines, cold stars in a clearing
He is away at Yuan Shangren's cottage, the Zen master
His close friend for thirty years; after snowfall a late view
Shows mountains not merely mountains, river more than river
He is somewhere deep in clouds, picking herbs on high slopes
A true hermit, we look upward to find him

I will divine a home-site in Zhongnan Mountains
Where I can be Wang Wei's neighbor
Plant beans and grow mums beneath white clouds
Quiet hours when scent of ink steals up
Beside the "Snowy Stream" Wang Wei painted
Invite a few poet friends to drink deeply
Where the mountains are deserted
Share the path with deer
Have herbal medicine for tea, pine nuts for grain
Follow the stream to where you can't get through

Li Bai is on the road to Sichuan
Du Fu is on the road to Ci-en Pagoda [2]
Han Yu listens to Master Ying play the zither
Luo Binwang chants a verse for cicadas
Pi Rixiu...Mr. Mellow Reciter...answers "moonlit stone"
They thrash out Zen ideas and go wandering with Zhuangzi
Du Yu, from my hometown, that bastard son of Du Mu
Was found guilty for his poems, then died in exile
Luo Yin lost all direction, lived only to write songs
For a courtesan named Luo Yunying….

Ah, when you're gone, I'll go back to the Tang dynasty
I'll divine a home-site on Zhongnan Mountain
On Zhongnan I will live out my days
I'm here to render up the love
Between Yan grass and Qin mulberries [3]
As a gift to stones
And I will render up myself
As a gift to windborne dust


Notes: [1] This refers to an anecdote about Jia Dao (779-843) . He was riding a donkey along a busy street, debating with himself whether to use the word "knock" or "push" in a poem, when he almost blundered into the high official Han Yu. Instead of being angry, Han Yu asked Jia Dao what he was thinking about, and the two men became friends. The words TUI and QIAO ("knock" and "push")were later combined into TUIQIAO, meaning to carefully weigh and choose one's words.
[2] The poet Du Fu lived from 712 to 770. The Pagoda at Ci-en Monastery is a memorial for Xuan Zhuang (604-662) , the Buddhist pilgrim and translator who went to India and brought back many sutra books.
[3] "Yan" was an ancient state that was obliterated by the Qin in 222 B.C. "Yan" also refers to the mountain range north of Beijing; it is also used to refer to Beijing and surrounding districts. Qin was a warlike state in the northwest that obliterated all other states and founded the short-lived Qin dynasty, which was China's first imperial dynasty (221-206 BC) . "Qin" also came to be used as an alternate name of Shaanxi province.