Bai Juyi Quotes

Bai Juyi's verses paint gentle spring scenes and celebrate the joy of a newborn girl, perfect for readers who love tender poetry.

12 quotes

  1. Translation: ...It was early spring. They bathed her in the FlowerPure Pool, Which warmed and smoothed the creamy-tinted crystal of her skin

  2. Translation: And, because she so illumined and glorified her clan, She brought to every father, every mother through the empire, Happiness when a girl was born rather than a boy.

  3. Translation: ' ... / That we wished to fly in heaven, two birds with the wings of one, And to grow together on the earth, two branches of one tree.' Earth endures, heaven endures; some time both shall end, While this unending sorrow goes on and on for ever.

  4. Heat lingers As days are still long; Early mornings are cool While autumn is still young. Dew on the lotus Scatters pure perfume; Wind on the bamboos Gives off a gentle tinkling. I am idle and lonely, Lying down all day, Sick and decayed; No one asks for me; Thin dusk before my gates, Cassia blossoms inch deep.

  5. A little child paddles a little boat, Drifting about, and picking white lotuses. He does not know how to hide his tracks, And duckweed's opened up along his path.

  6. If the Fleeting World is but a long dream, it does not matter whether one is young or old.

  7. Two monks sit facing, playing chess on the mountain, The bamboo shadow on the board is dark and clear. Not a person sees the bamboo's shadow, One sometimes hears the pieces being moved.

  8. I remember, when I was young, How easily my mood changed from sad to gay. ... But now that age comes, A moment of joy is harder and harder to get.

  9. Autumn clouds, vague and obscure; The evening, lonely and chill. I felt the dampness on my garments, But saw no spot, and heard no sound of rain.

  10. Fumes of wine shorten the long road.

  11. A strip of water's spread in the setting sun, Half the river's emerald, half is red. I love the third night of the ninth month, The dew is like a pearl; the moon like a bow.

  12. “Sent as a present from Annam A red cockatoo. Coloured like the peach-tree blossom, Speaking with the speech of men. And they did to it what is always done To the learned and eloquent. They took a cage with stout bars And shut it up inside.”