The Useless Tree

Poetry

  • Lone Goose

    Posting has dropped off in the past week.  I've been busy with work.  And some crazy stuff has happened in my department: turns out a man we had hired as a visiting professor (i.e. not a permanent faculty member) was… Continue reading

  • A Poem by Wang Wei

    A friend (thanks Tracy!) recently gave me David Hinton's translation of poems by Wang Wei, the great Tang poet. I like Hinton's translations of Chinese philosophy, precisely because he translates so much poetry, which, I think, gives him a certain… Continue reading

  • Feeling the Summer and Two by Li Po

          It's hot here, as is so much of the Eastern US just now.  The seasonal change has come in due course, building up to this rather early burst of heat.  I've had some time to adjust to the dwindling… Continue reading

  • In Sympathy for the people of Sichuan

         It is difficult to respond to a terrible tragedy on the scale of what is unfolding in Sichuan.  Unlike Burma, there is no hard political edge here, just awful human suffering.  So, I turn to Tu Fu (Du… Continue reading

  • Du Fu (Tu Fu) and Li Bai (Li Po) Talk to Each Other

    At Sky’s-End Thinking of Li Poby Tu Fu In these last outskirts of sky, coldWinds rise.  What are you thinking?Will geese ever arrive, now autumnWaters swamp rivers and lakes there? Art resents life fulfilled, and goblinsDine on mountain travelers with… Continue reading

  • Li Po (Li Bai) on Chuang Tzu

    Ancient Song Chuang-tzu dreams he’s a butterfly,and a butterfly becomes Chuang-tzu. All transformation this one body, boundless occurrence goes on and on: it’s no surprise eastern seas become western streams shallow and clear, or the melon-grower at Ch’ing Gate once… Continue reading

  • Tao Poem

          A reader sends in this poem, by Charles Wright, heard on this morning’s Writer’s Almanac, on NPR: After Reading T’ao Ch’ing, I wander Untethered Through the Short Grass Dry spring, no rain for five weeks. Already the lush… Continue reading

  • A Favorite, Though Sad, Tu Fu Poem

    The Lone Goose Never eating or drinking, the lone gooseFlies – thinking of its flock, calling out.Who pities a flake of shadow lost beyondTen-thousand clouds?  It stares far-off, As if glimpses of them remained.  SorrowsMount – it almost hears them… Continue reading

  • Li Po on Way

         Looking For Yung, The Recluse Master Emerald peaks polish heaven.  I wander,sweeping clouds away, forgetting years, looking for the ancient Way.  Restingagainst a tree, I listen to streamwater, black ox dozing among warm blossoms, white crane asleep in… Continue reading

  • A Little Tu Fu

         Here’s an anti-war lament by Tu Fu to think about: Moonlit Night Thinking of My Brothers Warning drums have ended all travel.A lone goose cries across autumnBorderlands.  White Dew begins tonight,This bright moon bright there, over My old… Continue reading