Page:The poet Li Po - Waley.djvu/23

Now and of old your journeys have never ceased:Strong were that man's limbsWho could run beside you on your travels to and fro.

The grass does not refuseTo flourish in the spring wind;The leaves are not angryAt falling through the autumn sky.Who with whip or spurCan urge the feet of Time?The things of the world flourish and decay,Each at its own hour.

Hsi-ho, Hsi-ho,^[1]Is it true that once you loitered in the WestWhile Lu Yang^[2] raised his spear, to holdThe progress of your light;Then plunged and sank in the turmoil of the sea?Rebels against Heaven, slanderers of Fate;Many defy the Way.But I will put | the Whole Lump | of Life in my bag,And merge my being in the Primal Element.

By the river-side at Jo-yeh,girls plucking lotus;Laughing across the lotus-flowers,each whispers to a friend.Their powdered cheeks, lit by the sun,are mirrored deep in the pool;Their scented skirts, caught by the wind,flap high in the air.

1. Charioteer of the Sun.
2. Who, like Joshua, stopped the sun during a battle. See Huai-nan Tzŭ, chap. vi.