How did your tin-edged cane get here?
The autumn wind's already sighing.
The rain's laid waste the great court's chrysanthemums,
And frost has felled half the pond's lotuses.
Banished, you don't renounce your nature,
In limbo, you don't depart from Chan.
Now we've met, we can spend all night together,
The Gansu moon shines round upon us.
杖锡何来此，秋风已飒然。
雨荒深院菊，霜倒半池莲。
放逐宁违性，虚空不离禅。
相逢成夜宿，陇月向人圆。
This poem dates from 759.
Chan is the original, Chinese, form of Zen Buddhism. Gansu is the province of north-western China to which Abbot Zan had been exiled.
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