Big rat poems

a present of calligraphy your true wild monk won't fall for wine well wrought characters do it for him a wild ink brush finds its way through the sky cloud makes fine parchment here let me compose black bolt of lightning flies from my hand as water from a pure spring the apt word flows when I write see how dark the clouds gather and washing the inkstone, a mountain in torrents fresh green in the sun that follows the ox and the village, track's happy slant then here comes this angry serpent — invective and just as meaning, wild wind at our throats I'd better put down my brush right now before these big waves sink any more boats climbing through far away clouds 'in the clouds of a dynasty long lost I climbed picking through fragrant grasses through clouds of five colours all spirited and I myself by eye cast above peer down among straight pines to yearn' there — and I hope that will serve for my turn that you'll raise a glass with me this day then let us call each other scholars drink till we forget who's farewelled and who will stay bound for Hunan in the summer rains rivers and lakes are all connected these two kinds of water wash from the sky bound south this one sail chokes in the shallows no wind in the weeds we swelter becalmed ah, when the snow sings — will the unwashed hear? let me rise like a crane show the river its wings

three big rat poems 1 give stone to the stone height to the mountain green to the pine give courage to men virtue and loyalty just this poor house where as in the book of songs a famous rat eats the seedlings as they rise I could leave but to me this old hut means friendship and who knows what this rat was before or may yet be

2 the rat got through the heavy mud wall gnaws the silk on the loom it leaves some clay but not a stitch of cloth withered mulberries greet first light the empty loom shows chill dusk the common folk are great advocates of fat horses, gorgeous clothes how hungry and feeble the aspiring are heaven trains its eye on this rat

3 the day before yesterday you left my hair turned white as the sleepless grass now here the insects are loud with stillness the rat rustles round out of doors half a month since the wind ran