Excerpt from "Hard Roads in Shu" -- Li Bai

Oh but it is high and dangerous!
Such traveling is harder than scaling the blue sky.
Until two rulers of this region
Pushed their way through in the misty ages,
Forty-eight thousand years had passed
With nobody arriving across the Qin border.

And the Great White Mountain, westward, still has only a bird's path
Up to the summit of Emei Peak-
Which was broken once by an earthquake and brave men were lost,
Just finishing the stone rungs of their steps toward heaven.

High as on a tall flag, six dragons drive the sun,
While the river far below lashes its twisted course.
Such height would be hard going for even a yellow crane,
So pity the poor monkeys who have only paws to yse.

The Mountain of Green Clay is formed of many circles-
Each hundred steps, we have to turn nine times among its mound-
Panting we brush Orion and pass the Well Star
Then, holding our chests with our hands and sinking to the ground with a groan,
We wonder if this westward path will never have an end.

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Poem selected by Dawn Stanton, translator unknown.

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The great Tang Dynasty poet Li Bai (701-762) was born in Suiye, China. His family moved to Jiangyou (170 km from Chengdu) when he was 5 years old. Li Bai left Jiangyou at the age of 20 and traveled throughout much of his life.

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