The Old Dust

by Li Bai

　　The dead, a man come home.

　　One brief journey betwixt heaven and earth,

　　Then, alas! we are the same old dust of ten thousand ages.

　　The rabbit in the moon pounds the medicine in vain;

　　Fu-sang, the tree of immortality, has crumbled to kindling wood.

　　Man dies, his white bones are dumb without a word

　　When the green pines feel the coming of the spring.

　　Looking back, I sigh; looking before, I sigh again.

　　What is there to prize in the life's vaporous glory?

　　Li Po