Moonlight reflects off the front of my bed.
Could it actually be the frost on the ground?
I look up to view the bright moon,
And look down to reminisce about my hometown.
“Thoughts in the Silent Night” was written by the Tang Dynasty poet 李白 (Lǐbái).
Leonard often shares Chinese poems, and this one is simply wonderful:
It’s so hard to be together, and so hard to part: a tender
east wind is powerless: the hundred blossoms crumble:
the heart-thread doesn’t end until the silkworm’s dead,
and tears don’t dry until the candle’s burnt into ash:
she grieves, seeing white hair in her morning mirror,
and chanting at night, she feels the chill of moonlight:
exquisite Paradise Mountain—it isn’t so very far away,
and that azure bird can show us the way back anytime.
translated by David Hinton
The Cheesesellers Wife 