Mottled Bamboo

Mottled Bamboo

by Yuan Zhen

Mottled bamboo glides past my boat along the Xiangshui and Yuanshui,

Evoking my yearning for home, a thousand miles away.

-- The pole from the temple to the consorts of Lord Shun

Comes with the ladies' tearstains on it all the way, through wind and rain.

The poet Yuan Zhen (779-831), a friend of Bai Juyi, also enjoyed the same renown. Yuan Zhen is best known for a short story he wrote about the secret love between a young scholar and a beautiful lass.

A well-known Chinese legend recounts Lord Shun's death on a tour to the south, when his two consorts mourned for his demise, and drowned themselves in the Xiangshui River. After their death they became goddesses of the river. Their tears became mottles on the stalks of the bamboo.