Sitting Alone on Zhao Ting Mountain
In the distance birds fly by
A cloud meanders without purpose
We become one
The mountain and me.
With the passage of time
The mountain remains.
- Li Bai (Li Po, Li Bo) 701-762.
According to legend, while drifting on the Yangtze River one evening, Li Bai reached over the side of his boat to embrace the moon. Inebriated, he fell in and drowned. Other, less poetic, descriptions of his passing also exist. Heron Dance translation.
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