Rapidly tonight my boat floats down the river under a cloud-dappled sky. I look into the water; it is as clear as the night. When clouds float past the moon, I seem them floating in the river, and feel I am rowing in the sky.
I think of my love … mirrored so in my heart. ~Tu Fu*
sun-tipped blossom submitted in response to Cee’s flower of the day photo challenge
*cited: The Jude Flute Gutenberg.org
Urban Hiking
I am old and I am bored. I was never very wise and my mind has never walked much further than my feet. Oh my forest, my forest … I go back and back to wander there.
There blue fingers of the moon still play on my old lute. There wind scatters clouds and comes down to flutter my robe.
You ask me what is the best happiness of all? In the forest it is sweet to hear a girl singing on the path, after she has stoped to ask her way, and thanked you with a smile. ~Wang-Wei*
Thank you Amy (The World is a Book) for this week’s lens-artists challenge: Keep Walking.
*cited: The Jade Flute: Chinese Poems in Prose: The Project Gutenberg
Regret that dropping sun’s dusk; Love this cold stream’s clearness. Western beams follow flowing water; Stir a ripple in wandering person’s mind. Idly sing, gazing at cloudy moon; Song done—sound of tall pines ~ Li Po (Translated: Arthur Waley, The Poet Li Po The Project Gutenberg
Pale green night and flowers all melting into one
in the soft haze–
Everywhere the moon, glimmering in the Spring night ~The Sarashina Diary (cited: Court Ladies of Old Japan)
Wait on, never forsake your hope,
For when the plum-tree is in flower
Even the unpromised, the unexpected, will come to you. ~The Sarashina Diary (cited: Court Ladies of Old Japan)
morning-glories
softly floating…
in the teacup ~Issa (cited: haikuguy.com)
Hop on over to Leya‘s to share your interpretation of Soft
(Part of a Poem in Irregular Metre.)
On through the night I flew, high over the Mirror Lake. The lake-moon cast my shadow on the waves and travelled with me to the stream of Shan. The Lord Hsieh’s* lodging-place was still there. The blue waters rippled; the cry of the apes was shrill. I shod my feet with the shoes of the Lord Hsieh and “climbed to Heaven on a ladder of dark clouds.”** Half-way up, I saw the unrisen sun hiding behind the sea and heard the Cock of Heaven crowing in the sky. By a thousand broken paths I twisted and turned from crag to crag. My eyes grew dim. I clutched at the rocks, and all was dark.
The roaring of bears and the singing of dragons echoed amid the stones and streams. The darkness of deep woods made me afraid. I trembled at the storied cliffs.
The clouds hung dark, as though they would rain; the air was dim with the spray of rushing waters.
Lightning flashed: thunder roared. Peaks and ridges tottered and broke. Suddenly the walls of the hollow where I stood sundered with a crash, and I looked down on a bottomless void of blue, where the sun and moon gleamed on a terrace of silver and gold.
A host of Beings descended—Cloud-spirits, whose coats were made of rainbow and the horses they rode on were the winds.
Skyscape photography at sunset on 63rd day of self isolation Nikon D750 f/8 1/100s 190 mm 400 ISO edited: Capture One 20 & Photoshop
cited:
The Poet Li Po, by Arthur Waley and Bai Li The Project Gutenberg ebook
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at http://www.gutenberg.org
Note:
*Hsieh Ling-yün (circa a.d. 400) was a famous mountain-climber who invented special mountain-climbing shoes.
**A quotation from one of Hsieh’s poems.
Stay at Home Order … day 29 plus 14 seclusion retreat days
‘Who and what are you?’
‘I am the Sabbath,’ said the other without moving. ‘I am the peace of God.’
C.K. Chesterton, The Man Who Was Thursday (The Project Gutenberg Ebook)
“‘What can you mean by all this?’ cried Syme. ‘They can’t be running the real world in that way. Surely not many working men are anarchists, and surely if they were, mere mobs could…
Nikon D750 f/5.6 1/320s 90mm 400 ISO
“… ‘Mere mobs!’ repeated his new friend with a snort of scorn. ‘So you talk about mobs and the working classes as if they were the question. You’ve got that eternal idiotic idea that if anarchy came it would come from the poor. Why should it? The poor have been rebels, but they have never been anarchists; they have more interest than anyone else in there being some decent government. The poor man really has a stake in the country. The rich man hasn’t; he can go away to New Guinea in a yacht. The poor have sometimes objected to being governed badly; the rich have always objected to being governed at all. Aristocrats were always anarchists, as you can see from the barons’ wars.’”
cited: G.K. Chesterton, The Man Who Was Thursday (The Project Gutenberg Ebook)
Note: “This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online at www.gutenberg.org.”
a meditative journey 
You must be logged in to post a comment.