On Hearing Tung Play the Flageolet

When this melody for the flageolet was made by Lady Ts'ai,
When long ago one by one she sang its eighteen stanzas,
Even the Tartars were shedding tears into the border-grasses,
And the envoy of China was heart-broken, turning back home with his escort.
. . . Cold fires now of old battles are grey on ancient forts,
And the wilderness is shadowed with white new-flying snow.
. . . When the player first brushes the Shang string and the
Chüeh and then the Yü,
Autumn-leaves in all four quarters are shaken with a murmur.
Tung, the master,
Must have been taught in heaven.
Demons come from the deep pine-wood and stealthily listen
To music slow, then quick, following his hand,
Now far away, now near again, according to his heart.
A hundred birds from an empty mountain scatter and return;
Three thousand miles of floating clouds darken and lighten;
A wildgoose fledgling, left behind, cries for its flock,
And a Tartar child for the mother he loves.
Then river waves are calmed
And birds are mute that were singing,
And Wu-chu tribes are homesick for their distant land,
And out of the dust of Siberian steppes rises a plaintive sorrow.
. . . Suddenly the low sound leaps to a freer tune,
Like a long wind swaying a forest, a downpour breaking tiles,
A cascade through the air, flying over tree-tops.
. . . A wild deer calls to his fellows. He is running among the mansions
In the corner of the capital by the Eastern Palace wall . . .
Phoenix Lake lies opposite the Gate of Green Jade;
But how can fame and profit concern a man of genius?
Day and night I long for him to bring his lute again.