He Zhizhang tracks down young ladies

It's not creepy by the standards of his day

Picking Water Lilies
He Zhizhang

Mt Kuaiji
Frees itself from mist and looms, monumental and green
Mysteriously
With the breezes gone, ripples move on Mirror Lake's sheen
The end of spring
Doesn't mean that all perfumed glories finish
Out in mid-stream
They're gathering caltrop blooms and water lilies


贺知章  采莲曲
稽山罢雾郁嵯峨，镜水无风也自波。
莫言春度芳菲尽，别有中流采芰荷。

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He Zhizhang (659-744) assumes a lot in this poem. He assumes that we know pretty young girls go to pick water lilies, and maybe meet a handsome suitor. He assumes that we’re very comfortable with the metaphor of young women as flowers, particularly springtime flowers. He assumes that we’re familiar with the traditional weathers associated with the seasons: mists and breezes in spring, clear heat in summer. And he assumes we know that Mt Kuaiji and Mirror Lake are spots of scenic beauty near modern day Shaoxing.

But hey, he’s right! We do know all this stuff, and so we can enjoy the delicate idea of tracking down springtime beauties by the ripples they stir up on a windless day…

Note on the form of the translation: The last time I did He Zhizhang poems, I settled on uneven line lengths with lots of internal assonance (shared vowel patterns to create a sort of parallel feeling). This time, it’s worked out exactly the same, and I don’t know how or why that happens. He’s poem does use alliteration but so much has changed in the pronunciation that I’m not able to say with any confidence how that alliteration sounds. I can only hope that whatever has filtered through into my English version is something from the original, and not some error of historical linguistics.