“_See the moon,--how she glances response to my song; See my shadow,--it dances so lightly along! While sober I feel you are both my good friends; When drunken I reel, our companionship ends. But we’ll soon have a greeting without a good-bye, At our next merry meeting away in the sky._” His control of the “stop-short” is considered to be perfect:-- (1.) “_The birds have all flown to their roost in the tree, The last cloud has just floated lazily by; But we never tire of each other, not we, As we sit there together,--the mountains and I._” (2.) “_I wake, and moonbeams play around my bed, Glittering like hoar-frost to my wondering eyes; Up towards the glorious moon I raise my head, Then lay me down,--and thoughts of home arise._” The following are general extracts:-- A PARTING. (1.) “_The river rolls crystal as clear as the sky, To blend far away with the blue waves of ocean; Man alone, when the hour of departure is nigh, With the wine-cup can soothe his emotion._ “_The birds of the valley sing loud in the sun, Where the gibbons their vigils will shortly be keeping: I thought that with tears I had long ago done, But now I shall never cease weeping._” (2.) “_Homeward at dusk the clanging rookery wings its eager flight; Then, chattering on the branches, all are pairing for the night. Plying her busy loom, a high-born dame is sitting near, And through the silken window-screen their voices strike her ear. She stops, and thinks of the absent spouse she may never see again; And late in the lonely hours of night her tears flow down like rain._” (3.) “_What is life after all but a dream? And why should such pother be made? Better far to be tipsy, I deem, And doze all day long in the shade._ “_When I wake and look out on the lawn, I hear midst the flowers a bird sing; I ask, ‘Is it evening or dawn?’ The mango-bird whistles, ‘’Tis spring.’_ “_Overpower’d with the beautiful sight, Another full goblet I pour, And would sing till the moon rises bright-- But soon I’m as drunk as before._” (4.) “_You ask what my soul does away in the sky, I inwardly smile but I cannot reply; Like the peach-blossoms carried away by the stream, I soar to a world of which you cannot dream._” One more extract may be given, chiefly to exhibit what is held by the Chinese to be of the very essence of real poetry,--suggestion. A poet should not dot his i’s. The Chinese reader likes to do that for himself, each according to his own fancy. Hence such a poem as the following, often quoted as a model in its own particular line:-- “_A tortoise I see on a lotus-flower resting: A bird ’mid the reeds and the rushes is nesting; A light skiff propelled by some boatman’s fair daughter, Whose song dies away o’er the fast-flowing water._” [Sidenote: TU FU]