A Night Affair - 夜情

1 舊曲暗傳一聲愁 An old melody came, carrying a sigh of sadness,
2 驚破夜半靜高樓 Midnight quietude in the high tower startled.
3 橫音何來亂我心 Where is this traverse sound that is messing up my heart?
4 唯見皎月照船頭 All I can see is the bright moon shining over a boat’s prow.

5 莫歸夢鄉舉三杯 Return not to hometown dreams but to thee - three cups raised,
6 與同嬋娟醉共遊 But with Lady Moon, together a boating we shall go.

 7 江水銀閃映花顏 A winsome face reflected upon the shimmering waters of silver,
8 明朝相別難幾有 Inevitable is the parting in the morn - what more chances do we have?

3. “traverse sounds” - made from a traverse/horizontal flute.

5. We don't know if the moon is telling the author or it is the other way round. Even the next line offers no clue as Chinese like to express themselves in the third person.

6. Personification of the moon as a pretty girl. 遊 go about in leisure frolicking, cruising etc. However, since line 4 mentions a boat, it would be apt to translate here as “boating”

7. “flower face”, beautiful looking like a flower

Wednesday, May 26, 2021

"Bygone Dreams" Revisited

 

In 1994, I wrote "Bygone Dreams".  At that time, most of my poems were in English.  

https://jeffinous.blogspot.com/2013/06/bygone-dreams.html

In 2016, I started delving into Chinese poetry.  I came across it and did a faithful Chinese translation.  Reproduced below is for easy reference.

The heavy hand of Allah,                                    阿拉重手

Shifting the burning sands of the Sahara.         推撥「撒哈拉」炎沙粒

Where now, is the great Temple of Ishtar?       今時「伊絲塔 」女神太廟 - 在何 ? 

A thousand years of glory --                            千年榮華 --

Just in a twinkle of the eternal stars,              星星瞬目之間

Mighty forests once lushed with life in green 威武綠林生靈

Spreading afar...                                             廣洪茂 ...

Are now but underground tar!                       已今是地下炭

For the Chinese reader, it is adequate to understand what the English version is trying to say. However, there is no evocation of elegance, nostalgia or romanticism in the translated version.  This is mostly due to the disparities between the two cultures and how are things are viewed. To the Westerner, "You are my sweetheart" smacks of endearment but not "my dearest heart and liver"!

During the pandemic lockdown,  I have the luxury of once more looking my past compositions and like a dear old friendship twice again rekindled, I was able to create a version that the Chinese can digest easily - the same desert imagery but a theme expressed quite differently.

1 千年北漠萬里沙 The thousand year desert of the north and its endless stretch of sand,

2 曾經綠遍為誰家 Was once lush, dressed in green, but for whom?

3 今日落雁明朝去 Today's descending Anser, gone tomorrow

4 塞外風聲何人掛 Beyond the frontier pass, the sighing wind is for whom?

3 A goose like creature is viewed in the west as some sort of a silly thing. The Anser is a migratory bird that often seen in such areas.  落雁 can be an allusion to one of the four greatest beauties of China.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wang_Zhaojun.  It was said that when she passed through the desert, a flock of Ansers were so smitten by her beauty that they forgot to fly and began to drop from the sky or to have a closer look at her. Her passing through is like an illusory transition.

4 Now that she was gone, who would be thinking of her? Perhaps the lovesick Emperor until some new beauty comes along!

Sunday, May 16 2021

The Left-Down and Right-Down-Concave Strokes of Life - 撇捺人生

This gem was from a Youtube video which I found  interesting enough to be on my blog.

上聯：若不撇開終為苦
下聯：各能捺住即成名
橫批：撇捺人生

If in not casting it away – bitterness in the end,
If in pressing firmly and stopped – fame results.
The casting away and firm convictions of life.

The left-down slant stroke of  若 (if) is not taken away, in the end it is 苦 “bitterness” 

 The right-down concave stroke of 各 (every) is not firmly pressed [and stop] it becomes 名(fame) 

The Left-Down and Right-Down-Concave Strokes of Life

Note: 撇 and 捺 are names of different strokes in Chinese calligraphy.

(若 -> 苦)

(各 -> 名)

Saturday, March 6, 2021

 

A Belated Entry

 
It had been a month since my last composition. I was in no mood in doing anything while laying on the bed like some invalid because of my feet. It was during the wee hours of one night when I woke up and getting back to sleep was difficult. Might as well put my overactive mind to do something good.

1 池塘微波攕水月 Gentle ripples shatter the watery moon on the pond,
2 樓高寂寞琴音絕 Lofty terraces are lonely when without music.
3 不知主人醉夢何 Of what dreams the master has in his inebriated dreams,
4 嫦娥孤淒五更別 Mournful is the lonely Moon Goddess departing at the Hour of the Fifth.

2 Can be towers or high buildings. I believe in this case a high open terrace where banquets are given and to enjoy the beauty of the moon. This is a variation of the couplet, “近水楼台先得月，向阳花木易逢春” – “waters near the high terraces will first get the moon (the reflection), sun-facing flowers and trees will greet spring earlier” - to mean those being nearer, chances of their first dibs are better.

3 “host” will not be an appropriate translation.

4. The personification of a loneliness forlorn mood denoted by the moon. The 5th Hour, the last two hours before daybreak.

Thursday, May 6, 2021

A Traveller's Woes

 
Today, the weather had changed, unlike yesterday's sunny day, it was dark, dank and cloudy. Still the wind added another layer of iciness...

1 東紅汗滴見無雲 Already drenched in sweat - nary a cloud seen in the glowing east,
2 夜臨密佈雨路人 But thick as pea soup as night approaches – only to be rained upon.
3 萬重山嶽千里河 A long and arduous journey through mountains and rivers,
4 蟾宮若憐借光問 If the moon had any sympathy, its guiding brilliance be lent.

5 起坐無安半曲彈 Up and down in restlessness, a half tune played,
6 徘徊夢景碎花魂 Pacing back and forth dreamscape, shattering away the souls of flowers.
7 野外風寒刺骨深 Frigid wind of the wild, pierces bones through and through,
8 家中燭影繞心神 And in the home, candlelight shadows mangling emotions into knots.

1 東紅 – The redness of the eastern sky. I didn’t want to use “The east is red” for unwanted inference. 空 can also mean “empty or vacuous”

2 密佈 – thickly spread. 雨 is used as a verb.

3 Literally, ten-thousand mountain peaks and thousand-mile rivers

4 蟾宮 – the moon, where the magical three-legged toad lives.

5 Standing and sitting

6 花 here is being personified.

Thursday, March 25, 2021

Another Seventh Night

It was an exercise for the brains to come up with this scheme and pattern. However, upon reading, it sounds dull and contrite and so changes were made without changing the general idea of the poem.

1 一踏鵲橋心萬句 Stepping upon the Magpie Bridge, a heart is laden with countless words,
2 悲歡離合總是淚 No matter - joys or reunions, tears are always in the end,
3 七夕年長七夕短 Yearning for the Night of Seventh is long but Seventh Night itself, far too short,
4 五更銀河五更去 The Milky Way in the Hour of the Fifth is but gone by the end of the Fifth Hour.

1 It is believed when the ill-fated stars of the Spinning Maid and Cowherd meet, magpies will fly together to form a bridge for the lovers to meet over the Milky Way.

3 The seventh night of the seventh lunar calendar is when the stars, Vega and Altair come closest together.

4. A Chinese hour is equivalent to two western hours. The 5th hour starts from 3am to 5am, i.e. by the hour’s end daylight begins to break and the lovers have to part.

Monday, March 29, 2021

Wonderful Midnight Encounters - 半夜奇遇

These three poems were the result of wakening up in the middle of the night for one reason or another and that my mind was too overactive to go back to sleep. Might as well do something useful...

1 一盤金菊重陽香 A pot of golden chrysanthemums fills the Double Ninth Festival with fragrance,
2龍鳳合杯再難嘗 No more that I had enjoyed the cups of the dragon and phoenix exchanged.
3 多年如此經已慣 So many years that I had grown accustomed to it,
4 默對銀鏡寂寞常 Silently I faced the silver mirror in loneliness all the time.

1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_Ninth_Festival

2 These cups for the bride and groom to exchange their wine to show conjugal bliss.

4. Literally can be the mirror or referring to the full moon.

1 冰雪寒山雲烟鎖 Shrouded in mists and fog is a cold mountain of ice and snow,

2 進退任選難以過 Forging ahead or retreating is no option.
3 隱約禪鐘迷津脱 When faint temple bell sounds came wafting in guidance,
4 驚破餘生紅塵錯 A sudden realization, shattering the wrongs in one’s remaining life.

3 A Buddhist temple, more specifically, the Chan/Zen sect.
4 Red dust – the mortal world.

Monday, May 10, 2021

1 微風水滴夢驚醒 Sounds of water dripping in the breeze woke me from my dreams,
2 邊枕寒冷早夜情 An earlier encounter of the night but now the pillow’s side is left in the cold.
3 雨後遍靜聽心韻 The rain has stopped, silence permeating except for my beating heart,
4 忐忐忑忑待月明 Pitter-pattering away as I wait for the moon to be full once more.

4 Literally, “waiting for the moon to turn bright again”

Monday, May 10, 2021