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Unsettled, a bird lost from the flock

T'ao Ch'ien, T'ao Ch'ien poetry, Buddhist, Buddhist poetry,  poetry, [TRADITION SUB2] poetry, Taoist poetry by T'ao Ch'ien
(365 - 427) Timeline

English version by
Wu-chi Liu

Original Language
Chinese

Buddhist
Taoist
4th Century

Unsettled, a bird lost from the flock --
Keeps flying by itself in the dusk.
Back and forth, it has no resting place,
Night after night, more anguished its cries.
Its shrill sound yearns for the pure and distant --
Coming from afar, how anxiously it flutters!

It chances to find a pine tree growing all apart;
Folding its wings, it has come home at last.
In the gusty wind there is no dense growth;
This canopy alone does not decay.
Having fround a perch to roost on,
In a thousand years it will not depart.

 

 

-- from Sunflower Splendor: Three Thousand Years of Chinese Poetry, Edited by Wu-chi Liu / Edited by Irving Yucheng Lo

Amazon.com

 

Themes

  Birds
  Bower
  Garden
  Night
  Sound


Recommended Books


The Selected Poems of T'ao Ch'ien, Translated by David Hinton
Sunflower Splendor: Three Thousand Years of Chinese Poetry, Edited by Wu-chi Liu / Edited by Irving Yucheng Lo

 

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Ivan M. Granger's original poetry, stories and commentaries are Copyright © 2002 - 2011 by Ivan M. Granger.
All other material is copyrighted by the respective authors, translators and/or publishers.