Monday, December 16, 2013

Remembering my Mom and that we would all do well to live in the moment...


Wandering at Oblique Creek

This new year makes it fifty suddenly
gone. Thinking of life’s steady return
to rest cuts deep,driving me to spend
all morning wandering.

Skies clear,air’s breath fresh,
I sit with friends beside this stream flowing far away.

Striped bream weave gentle currents;
calling gulls drift above idle valleys.

Eyes roaming distant waters, I find
ridge above ridge: it’s nothing like
majestic nine-fold immortality peaks,
but to reverent eyes it’s incomparable.

Taking the winejar, I pour a round,
and we start offering brimful toasts:
who knows where today might lead
or if all this will ever come true again.

After a few cups, my heart’s far away,
and I forget thousand-year sorrows:
ranging to the limit of this morning’s
joy, it isn’t tomorrow I’m looking for.

- T’ao Ch’ien (365-427), as interpreted by David Hinton, Mountain Home: The Wilderness Poetry of Ancient China