Thursday, December 25, 2008

Hearing an Oriole at the Palace

By Wang Wei

In spring trees shrouding palace windows,
a spring oriole sings dawn light into song.

It sets out to startle the world, stops short,
flutters here, there. Return impossibly far,

it hides deep among dew-drenched leaves,
darts into blossoms and out, never settled.

We wander life, no way back. Even a simple
birdcall starts us dreaming of home again.


Translated by David Hinton
From 'The Selected Poems of Wang Wei'

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