A Mortal Life, Born of One Thought · Stubborn and Foolish by Nature · 64 / 102
Lu Hua · Mortal Thoughts
Splendor is shallow, shallow; a touch of sorrow-forgetting incense tints the air, and the business of dreams grows distant. Here a place of revelry, there a place where red silks vie in beauty. This feeling, this scene, just so; this memory, this moment, dispersing. It was never more than this: a person is a blade of grass, and what one asks for is the plain and the quiet.
Petals wind themselves about the robe; the moon that has no equal is not yet done, and thought falls away and sinks. Who fears half a life as a prisoner; who is here for the sake of a first meeting. If you mean to overturn heaven and earth, you can still give battle with no pieces left on the board. I look for some pleasure: the flying white takes in every cold gaze.
Glosses—
red silk (xiāo): thin red silk gauze;
wind about (jiǎo rào): to encircle; to twine, to entangle;
flying white: snowflakes scattering on the wind.
*This piece is an original work. If you repost it, please credit the original author Guang Zhi Shiyi; any infringement, once discovered, will be pursued to the full extent of the law. In addition, the accompanying illustration comes from the internet and belongs to its original artist, Yichui Wuyue.