Is It Real?

The line, 如夢非夢花落紅, came suddenly into my mind on morning as I was checking out of the JW Marriott, Singapore. The first draft was completed during the delayed flight to Bangkok.

1 若真若假若夢中, Seemed real, seemed surreal and seemed in trance,
2 如醉如獃如相逢. Like in a stupor, like puppy eyed and like when we met.
3 舉杯獨酌舊人見, A cup lifted, a lonely drink for one from the past,
4 可憐明月照空空. Pity the bright moon shining to emptiness.

5 是往是今是一生, Whether in the past, whether in the present, a life lived,
6 花開花配花落紅. A flower bloomed, a flower betrothed, a flower fallen in red.
7 水流東盡何逆回, How can river flow to the east be reversed?
8 蓬山重聚去匆匆. If knowing where paradise is, with thee I be with in no time.

4 To the outside world, there is only one person drinking.

6 The flower is a metaphor for the poetic’s love who died young.

7 All rivers in China flow in an easterly direction due to its geography of the land. Literal translation of the line is “When flowing waters had reached its end in the east i.e., the ocean, how could the course be reversed?”

8 蓬山 is the mountain on one of the Three Blessed Isles situated in the Eastern Ocean. The dead cannot come back, only the living can go forward to death.

Friday, September 16, 2022