Li Po: The Two Visits

Visit to the Cold Clear Spring Ah! when the darkness blinds the orb of day This cold clear spring chatters my grief away, And, as the current whirls along, She lilts a little wordless song; This little wizard, clear and cold, Echoes the thoughts I left untold, And for music I have the sound Of the tall pines surging round. Visit to the White Stream Rapids I crossed the White Stream at its slender source When Dawn first cleft the tangle of the stars And shook the darkness from her. And I saw, Passing a while from the worn tracks of men, Islands innumerable environèd In Nature's colours gold and green. The sky Laid the blue mirror of eternity Upon the shining waters. One by one The clouds sailed out to sea. My random thoughts Went wandering where monsters silver-mailed Flash down their native streams. I sang the songs That swelled with noon and faltered with the dusk And failed in the twilight. Then I sought the gleam Of cottage eaves amid the moonlit fields.