Page:A Hundred and Seventy Chinese Poems (1919).djvu/215

 RELEASING A MIGRANT "YEN" [WILD-GOOSE]

Nine Rivers, in the tenth year, in winter,— heavy snow; The river-water covered with ice and the forests broken with their load. The birds of the air, hungry and cold, went flying east and west; And with them flew a migrant "yen," loudly clamouring for food. Among the snow it pecked for grass; and rested on the surface of the ice: It tried with its wings to scale the sky; but its tired flight was slow. The boys of the river spread a net and caught the bird as it flew; They took it in their hands to the city-market and sold it there alive. I that was once a man of the North am now an exile here: Bird and man, in their different kind, are each strangers in the south. And because the sight of an exiled bird wounded an exile's heart, I paid your ransom and set you free, and you flew away to the clouds. [ 209 ]