Ou-Yang Hsiu: Songs of the Night

I In flowing crowds The moon-born clouds Cast their light shade O’er stairs of jade; And all the moonlit ways are one, Shining in silver unison. Yet who can read aright The mystery of night? II Spring-time, and sounds of the streaming water-fall; Deep night, on shrunken hill-tops spreads her pall. The moon steers through a maze of pines, and lo, A thousand thrusting peaks are set aglow. III In the cold water the collected snow Melts, and the frozen stream begins to flow. The laughing girls slip homeward through the dark, While sand-birds wheel around the fisher's barque.