Drinking in the Abbot's Room at Sunggyo Temple Where the Monk Tong Lodges — Ten and More Gathered, Geomungo and Bipa Sounded Together and the Players' Show Was Put On as Well, So I Had the Guests Call Out Rhymes and Galloped My Brush飮通師所寓崇敎寺方丈。會者十餘人。及酒酣。琴瑟交作。倡戱幷呈。予舊習津湧。使坐客唱韻走筆。一人例唱四韻。兼自押傍韻。

Below the green rock at the southern corner of Ducheng (斗城), a golden dragon and an iron phoenix fly up over the clouds. When I first came the setting sun hung half upon the western ridge, and crying cranes and calling crows were heard of themselves, in vain. How earnest is our host's entertaining of us! It is as though old Huiyuan of Mount Kuang (匡山) were leading Tao Qian along. Laughing and talking is enough to warm an old man of the waters, and the weather of the tenth month becomes a spring drunkenness. I draw near the brazier and look at the root-fire, and sitting up high like a camel, I talk idle talk in vain. In the midst of drink there is none whose relish is like mine, and though the guests chatter, few of them know it. I said: a man's life is like the passing of lightning, and wealth and glory fall as easily as flowers. Once youth is gone, what then is to be done? One must surely be dead drunk and send the feathered cup flying. Look you — the seven nobles and the five marquises, when their fortune ran out, could not escape the roaming of the Nine Plains (九原). And even if those who went should stay a while again, ten thousand ages and a thousand years are as one autumn. The affairs of men, old and new, float like autumn clouds; the white sun sets in the west and the water runs east. The world of men is a prisoner in a southern cap (南冠), harried and bound; the flying bird is in the cage and the fish is on the hook. Before my words were done a guest rose up and danced, as though a tree of jade were breaking before the wind. At once he took the red strings and stroked them as his hand went, and the thin sound was so mournful that it seemed to whisper. The bonds of many lives are heavy, and each of us has met the others; and yet I fear that tomorrow morning we scatter like rain. Dongfang Manqian (東方曼倩) is already gone, and where besides is Master Chunyu? Two men have come forth after them with skill and to spare, and hand in hand they came to the monk's house. Our monk's measure is like river and sea, and he suffers your company to share in his waves. I grieve now that the lot I was born to has gone awry, and borrowing your play, I sing for a while in good cheer. Of all the glad and laughing things of my life there is none better than this; but the east is about to brighten — what shall I do with this joy?