StarDestroyer.Net BBS

Ok, so I'm going to be doing a calligraphy piece based on a poem by Li Bai (aka Li Po).

Here is the poem and two translations as given here:



The literal translation as given to me by my father is:

Title – Sitting in the wilderness by myself.
First line – Birds flying high above the Sky
Second line – Lonely cloud floats by
Third line – Both eyes wondering (or viewing) everywhere endlessly
Fourth line – Only me and the high mountains

The version that most inspired me is the one given in Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri (Environmental Economics):

We sit together, the mountain and I,
Until only the mountain remains.

So I'm trying to decide which version, or combination of versions I should use. I'd definitely like to use the Alpha Centauri version as it "speaks" more to me personally. I was considering using both translations in the pic as a single poem, but I don't know...

Any suggestions?

Well, in the second one, you have the motif of things going away: the birds, the clouds, the speaker. So if you want to keep those last two lines, then I suggest building on the second translation.

Then again, the literal translation to the English versions are kind of... not the same. So what sort of effect are you trying to get with the poem?

It's the poem that inspired this painting

So I was wanting to write it down to accompany the painting.

I'm trying to convey a sort of peacefulness, serenity, and stillness.

The first. It's less grammatically broken and it feels more complete. I might be biased though to more simple (or to me anyway) style, but I feel the first one more then the second, if that makes any sense.

Well, I'm still leaning towards the second one which flows a lot better if you substitute the third line with the one from the game:

The birds have vanished down the sky.
Now the last cloud drains away.
We sit together, the mountain and I,
until only the mountain remains.

Change "vanished down" and "cloud drains". It creates the image of a toilet or a sink, which kind of ruins the effect of the poem.