Tuesday, May 12, 2015

賈島的"孟融逸人"/ Jia Dao's "Meng Rong, Man of Leisure"

Among the armful of Chinese poetry books I'm fortunate to own is the wonderfully-titled When I Find You Again It Will Be In Mountains, a collection of poems by 賈島 Jia Dao translated by Mike O'Connor. I found the poem below in that book, and liked it enough to try translating it myself. Whatever the merits of my translation, I certainly can't rival O'Connor's choice of title: "Meng Jung, Gainfully Unemployed."

More about Jia Dao can be found at Wikipedia, of course, while several of his poems can be read in both Chinese and English here. The latter link is also home to a lot more classical Chinese poetry in translation, as well as other neat stuff.

 Enjoy, folks, and take it easy.

微臣
史大偉

***

孟融逸人
賈島

孟君臨水居
不食水中魚
衣褐唯麤帛
筐箱秪素書
樹林幽鳥戀
世界此心疏
擬櫂孤舟去
何峰又結廬

"Meng Rong, Man of Leisure"
Jia Dao

Meng, my good man, your home overlooks the water
but you eat none of the fish therein

You wear only coarse homespun cloth
in your baskets and boxes only plain silk books

Reclusive birds long for the forest
the world is far from your mind

If you plan to row off in a lonely boat
on which peak will you build your house this time?

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