Short Poems

The morning star has set. A lark
rises out of the long grass as I take
My hoe and close my twig gate.
my cloth breeches are wet with dew.
Boy, if these were peaceful times,
who'd be fretting about his wet clothes?

The blooming flowers, the galaxies of space,
Lie pictured in a sheeny drop of even;
And globed in one round word, on lips of grace,
Shine out the best of earth and all of heaven.

moonlit night—
out on the stone
a cricket singing

With the unseen God,
Who seeth all secret things,
In the silence—
Communes from the earth below,
The heart of the man sincere.

A Lord with slave of fairy-face commenced in sport and laughter,
What marvel if the Lord grew slave, and slave was Master, after?
Best speeds the servant bearing pots, or piling high the bricks;
When such an one is o'er-endeared like a fed ass he kicks.

Pressing my breasts
I softly kick aside
the curtain of mystery
How deep the crimson
of the flower here.

As a gray hawk's eyes
Turn here and away,
So my course turns
Where I walk each day.

What happiness you gave to me
Underneath this graveyard tree
When in my embraces wound,
Dear heart, you lay above the ground.

Some leaves hang late, some fall
before the first frost—so goes
the tale of winter branches and old bones.

Lined coat, warm cap and easy felt slippers,
In the little tower, at the low window, sitting over the sunken brazier.
Body at rest, heart at peace; no need to rise early.
I wonder if the courtiers at the Western Capital know of these things or not?