Among the blossoms, a single jar of wine.No one else here, I ladle it out myself.Raising my cup, I toast the bright moon,and facing my shadow makes friends three,though moon has never understood wine,and shadow only trails along behind me.Kindred a moment with moon and shadow,I’ve found a joy that must infuse spring:I sing, and moon rocks back and forth;I dance, and shadow tumbles into pieces.Sober, we’re together and happy. Drunk,we scatter away into our own directions.Intimates forever, we’ll wander carefreeand meet again in Star River distances.
Drinking Alone Beneath the Moon
Li Po
Translated from the Chinese by David Hinton
Feature Date
- November 7, 2022
Series
- Translation, What Sparks Poetry
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“Drinking Alone Beneath the Moon” by Li Po, translated by David Hinton, from THE SELECTED POEMS OF LI PO, copyright ©1996 by David Hinton.
Used by permission of New Directions Publishing Corp.
All rights reserved.
Reproduced by Poetry Daily with permission.
Widely considered one of ancient China’s greatest poets, Li Po lived in the eighth century. Heavily influenced by Ch’an (Zen) Buddhism, he moved through life with the same effortless spontaneity as the Cosmos. It was a life characterized by whimsical travel, wild drinking, and a gleeful disdain for decorum and authority. And it is said he died the same spirit: out drunk in a boat, he fell into a river and drowned trying to embrace the moon. His work is available in David Hinton’s The Selected Poems of Li Po (New Directions) or more briefly in Classical Chinese Poetry: An Anthology (FSG).
David Hinton has published many books of poetry, nonfiction, and translations of ancient Chinese poetry and philosophy. These books are all informed by an abiding interest in deep ecological thinking, in exploring the weave of consciousness and landscape. This work has earned wide aclaim and many national awards, and it can be visited at davidhinton.net. Hinton’s new book is: Wild Mind, Wild Earth: Our Place in the Sixth Extinction.
New York, New York
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