Fields, villages and lanes
    Shall throng with happy men;
    Good rule protect the people and make known
    The King’s benevolence to all the land;
    Stern discipline prepare
    Their natures for the soft caress of Art. 
    O Soul come back to where the good are praised!

    Like the sun shining over the four seas
    Shall be the reputation of our King;
    His deeds, matched only in Heaven, shall repair
    The wrongs endured by every tribe of men,—­
    Northward to Yu and southward to Annam
    To the Sheep’s Gut Mountain and the Eastern Seas. 
    O Soul come back to where the wise are sought!

    Behold the glorious virtues of our King
    Triumphant, terrible;
    Behold with solemn faces in the Hall
    The Three Grand Ministers walk up and down,—­
    None chosen for the post save landed-lords
    Or, in default, Knights of the Nine Degrees. 
    At the first ray of dawn already is hung
    The shooting-target, where with bow in hand
    And arrows under arm,
    Each archer does obeisance to each,
    Willing to yield his rights of precedence. 
    O Soul come back to where men honour still
    The name of the Three Kings.[2]

[1] The harp.

[2] Yuu, T`ang and Wen1, the three just rulers of antiquity.

WANG WEI

[A.D. 699-759]

[2] PROSE LETTER

To the Bachelor-of-Arts P`ei Ti

Of late during the sacrificial month, the weather has been calm and clear, and I might easily have crossed the mountain.  But I knew that you were conning the classics and did not dare disturb you.  So I roamed about the mountain-side, rested at the Kan-p`ei Temple, dined with the mountain priests, and, after dinner, came home again.  Going northwards, I crossed the Yuuan-pa, over whose waters the unclouded moon shone with dazzling rim.  When night was far advanced, I mounted Hua-tzuu’s Hill and saw the moonlight tossed up and thrown down by the jostling waves of Wang River.  On the wintry mountain distant lights twinkled and vanished; in some deep lane beyond the forest a dog barked at the cold, with a cry as fierce as a wolf’s.  The sound of villagers grinding their corn at night filled the gaps between the slow chiming of a distant bell.

Now I am sitting alone.  I listen, but cannot hear my grooms and servants move or speak.  I think much of old days:  how hand in hand, composing poems as we went, we walked down twisting paths to the banks of clear streams.

We must wait for Spring to come:  till the grasses sprout and the trees bloom.  Then wandering together in the spring hills we shall see the trout leap lightly from the stream, the white gulls stretch their wings, the dew fall on the green moss.  And in the morning we shall hear the cry of curlews in the barley-fields.