The Lady in the Moon (Li Shang-Yin, 812(?) — 58)

(“Ch’ang O stole the herb of immortality and fled to the moon. Because the moon is white, she is called the White Beauty. In the third autumn month, the Dark Maid emerges to send down the frost and snow” — cf. Tu Fu, ‘The Autumn Wastes,’ No. 4)

(i) Ch’ang O

The lamp glows deep in the mica screen.

The long river slowly descends, the morning star drowns.

Ch’ang O, sorry that she stole the magic herb,

Between the blue sky and the emerald sea, thinking night after night?

(ii) Frosty Moon

First calls of the migrant geese, no more cicadas.

South of this hundred-foot tower the water runs straight to the sky.

The Dark Maid and the White Beauty endure the cold together,

Rivals in elegance amid the frost on the moon.