A Toast for Men Yun-Ch’ing

Illimitable happiness,

But grief for our white heads.

We love the long watches of the night, the red candle.

It would be difficult to have too much of meeting,

Let us not be in hurry to talk of separation.

But because the Heaven River will sink,

We had better empty the wine-cups.

To-morrow, at bright dawn, the world’s business will entangle us.

We brush away our tears,

We go—East and West.

Source: Fir-flower Tablets: Poems Translated from the Chinese (Houghton Mifflin, 1921)