English Rendering
Alas, all my life I've seen friends and companions fall off,
And now how many of them survive?
With gray hair hanging in vain three thousand zhang long,
I laugh away all worldly things.
Is there anything left, you ask, that might cheer me?
I see in green mountains such charm allure,
I expect they see the same in me,
For in heart and in appearance
We are a bit similar.
Goblet in hand, scratching my head at the east window,
I presume that Tao Yuanming, having finished his poem
Hovering Clouds,
Was in the same mood I am now.
Those on the south side of the Yangtze who play drunkard
in pursuit of fame,
How could they know the magic of unstrained wine?
Looking back, I'll conjure a gust of wind
and send clouds flying.
I regret not that I can't meet the ancients,
But that the ancients had no chance to see my wildness.
Those who understand me
Number only two or three.
