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Tao Yuanming quotes
White hair covers my temples, I am wrinkled and gnarled beyond repair, And though I have got five sons, They all hate paper and brush. A-shu is eighteen: For laziness there is none like him. A-hsuan does his best, But really loathes the Fine Arts. Yung and Tuan are thirteen, But do not know "six" from "seven." T'ung-tzu in his ninth year Is only concerned with things to eat. If Heaven treats me like this, What can I do but fill my cup?
Tao Yuanming
Let us drink and enjoy together the wine you have brought: For my course is set and cannot now be altered.
Tao Yuanming
Let me then remember, to calm my heart's distress, That the Sages of old were often in like case.
Tao Yuanming
There were often times when we had no wine to drink, However, this morning we fill the empty beakers. Over the new spring wine midges hover- When will we ever taste its like again? Tables with funeral meats stand piled high before us, Old friends and relatives come and weep beside us. We try to speak but cannot utter words, We try to see but our eyes are dim. Once he used to sleep within the lofty hall, Now he will spend the night out on the lonely moor. Leaving the city gate we accompanied him thither But we were back again before midnight had come.
Tao Yuanming
I beg you listen to this advice- When you can get wine, be sure to drink it.
Tao Yuanming
The pure air is cleansed of lingering lees And mysteriously, Heaven's realms are high.
Tao Yuanming
The mountain air is fine at evening of the day And flying birds return together homewards. Within these things there is a hint of Truth, But when I start to tell it, I cannot find the words.
Tao Yuanming
I wish to speak but lips can shape no voice, I wish to see but light has left my eye.
Tao Yuanming
Distant, distant I gaze at the white clouds: With a deep yearning I think of the Sages of Antiquity.
Tao Yuanming
Long I lived checked by the bars of a cage; Now I have turned again to Nature and Freedom.
Tao Yuanming
Heaven and Earth exist for ever: Mountains and rivers never change. But herbs and trees in perpetual rotation Are renovated and withered by the dews and frosts: And Man the wise, Man the divine- Shall he alone escape this law? Fortuitously appearing for a moment in the World He suddenly departs, never to return.
Tao Yuanming
Amidst wild weeds to rest I now descend. When once I pass beyond the city gate I shall return to darkness without end.
Tao Yuanming
In former days I wanted wine to drink; The wine this morning fills the cup in vain.
Tao Yuanming
And human life how should it not be hard? From ancient times there was none but had to die, Remembering this scorches my very heart. What is there I can do to assuage this mood? Only enjoy myself drinking my unstrained wine. I do not know about a thousand years, Rather let me make this morning last forever.
Tao Yuanming
While picking asters 'neath the Eastern fence, My gaze upon the Southern mountain rests.
Tao Yuanming
You had better go where Fate leads- Drift on the Stream of Infinite Flux, Without joy, without fear: When you must go-then go.
Tao Yuanming
I would gladly wander in Paradise, But it is far away and there is no road.
Tao Yuanming
God can only set in motion: He cannot control the things he has made.
Tao Yuanming
At a single glance I survey the whole Universe. He will never be happy, whom such pleasures fail to please!
Tao Yuanming
I am free from ties and can live a life of retirement. When I rise from sleep, I play with books and harp.
Tao Yuanming