Dancing with the Dead: The Essential Red Pine Translations - Softcover

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Bill Porter assumes the pen name Red Pine for his translation work. He was born in Los Angeles in 1943, grew up in the Idaho Panhandle, served a tour of duty in the US Army, graduated from the University of California with a degree in anthropology, and attended graduate school at Columbia University. Uninspired by the prospect of an academic career, he dropped out of Columbia and moved to a Buddhist monastery in Taiwan. After four years with the monks and nuns, he struck out on his own and eventually found work at English-language radio stations in Taiwan and Hong Kong, where he interviewed local dignitaries and produced more than a thousand programs about his travels in China. He lives in Port Townsend, Washington.

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from The Mountain Poems of Stonehouse

78

Someone asked what year I arrived

I had to think before the answer came

the peach tree I planted outside my door

has flowered in spring twenty times.

from Poems of the Masters - Ye Shaoweng

109. Visiting a Private Garden Without Success

It must be because he hates clogs on his moss

I knocked ten times still his gate stayed closed

but spring can't be kept locked inside a garden

a branch of red blossoms reached past the wall.

from In Such Hard Times - Wei Yingwu

149. While Observing Local Customs, I Visited My Daoist Nephew Without Success and Wrote This on His Wall

Last year's mountain stream is still flowing today

last year's apricot blossoms I picked again today

a hermit on the trail asked me who I am

I'm the same spring visitor as last year.

from In Such Hard Times - Wei Yingwu

91. Meeting Secretary Lu Geng of Luoyang in Yangzhou

In the land of Chu friends are rare

meeting you here was unexpected

I've kept your letters close to my heart

how strange to see white in your hair

our cups overflow with an innkeeper's wine

our luggage is full of river travel poems

let's toast to riding together again

as we once did on Luoyang Bridge.