'For years on revolution's waves I've tossed,
While wife and bairns mourned me in hopeless plight;
And now to-night, as in a dream, I sit
With all my loved ones 'neath the lamp's bright light.'
The Pleasures of a Simple Life with Nature
BY LI-SHANG-YIN
T'ang Dynasty
On these pleasant hills residing,
Far from worldly din and strife,
Leisurely with nature living,
Here I pass a happy life.
Gently wave the bamboo copses,
Fanned by evening breezes light;
While the flowers and moon-beams mingle
In the ghostly hours of night.
Through ravines the waters gurgle,
Stemmed by scattered rock and stone;
Round the bends the footpath wanders—
By the mosses overgrown.
Here with friends and habits simple,
And a cup of generous wine,
Fingering lute and old songs singing—
For no other heaven I pine.