Almost Alone

by Nightcrawler (kmanetta@earthlink.net)

ALONE IN HER BEAUTY
by Du Fu

Who is lovelier than she? 
Yet she lives alone in an empty 
valley. 
She tells me she came from a good family 
Which is humbled now 
into the dust. 
....When trouble arose in the Kuan district, 
Her brothers 
and close kin were killed. 
What use were their high offices, 
Not even 
shielding their own lives? -- 
The world has but scorn for adversity; 

Hope goes out, like the light of a candle. 
Her husband, with a vagrant 
heart, 
Seeks a new face like a new piece of jade; 
And when 
morning-glories furl at night 
And mandarin-ducks lie side by side, 
All 
he can see is the smile of the new love, 
While the old love weeps unheard. 

The brook was pure in its mountain source, 
But away from the mountain 
its waters darken. 
....Waiting for her maid to come from selling pearls 

For straw to cover the roof again, 
She picks a few flowers, no longer 
for her hair, 
And lets pine-needles fall through her fingers, 
And, 
forgetting her thin silk sleeve and the cold, 
She leans in the sunset by a 
tall bamboo.