At Nine Rivers,[75] in the tenth year,[76] in winter,—heavy snow;
The river-water covered with ice and the forests broken with their load.[77]
The birds of the air, hungry and cold, went flying east and west;
And with them flew a migrant “yen,” loudly clamouring for food.
Among the snow it pecked for grass; and rested on the surface of the ice:
It tried with its wings to scale the sky; but its tired flight was slow.
The boys of the river spread a net and caught the bird as it flew;
They took it in their hands to the city-market and sold it there alive.
I that was once a man of the North am now an exile here:
Bird and man, in their different kind, are each strangers in the south.
And because the sight of an exiled bird wounded an exile’s heart,
I paid your ransom and set you free, and you flew away to the clouds.
Yen, Yen, flying to the clouds, tell me, whither shall you go?
Of all things I bid you, do not fly to the land of the north-west
In Huai-hsi there are rebel bands[78] that have not been subdued;
And a thousand thousand armoured men have long been camped in war.
The official army and the rebel army have grown old in their opposite trenches;
The soldier’s rations have grown so small, they’ll be glad of even you.
The brave boys, in their hungry plight, will shoot you and eat your flesh;
They will pluck from your body those long feathers and make them into arrow-wings!
[75] Kiukiang, the poet’s place of exile.
[76] A.D. 815. His first winter at Kiukiang.
[77] By the weight of snow.
[78] The revolt of Wu Yüan-chi.
TO A PORTRAIT PAINTER WHO DESIRED HIM TO SIT
You, so bravely splashing reds and blues!
Just when I am getting wrinkled and old.
Why should you waste the moments of inspiration
Tracing the withered limbs of a sick man?
Tall, tall is the Palace of Ch’i-lin;[79]
But my deeds have not been frescoed on its walls.
Minutely limned on a foot of painting silk—
What can I do with a portrait such as that?
[79] One of the “Record Offices” of the T’ang dynasty, where meritorious deeds were illustrated on the walls.