Pú Sà MánPusa Man 菩萨蛮
Wei Zhuang on spring water south of the Yangtze and painted boats in the rain.
Original Chinese text with pinyin
春水碧于天
chūn shuǐ bì yú tiān
画船听雨眠
huà chuán tīng yǔ mián
Simplified characters; traditional title: 菩薩蠻. This is a long poem; only the best-known lines are shown, and “……” marks omitted passages.
Note on the text: This page presents a well-known excerpt; the full poem is longer in the traditional corpus.
English translation
Spring water bluer than the sky;
in a painted boat I fall asleep to the rain.
Original translation by Poetune — literal but poetic, written for this site.
Line by line
Meaning and imagery
Wei Zhuang on spring water south of the Yangtze and painted boats in the rain. The scene stays with you.
Background
Wei Zhuang on spring water south of the Yangtze and painted boats in the rain.
Key words
- 春水 chūn shuǐ
- spring waters
- 碧于 bì yú
- greener than; bluer than
- 画船 huà chuán
- a painted pleasure boat
About the poet: Wei Zhuang
Wei Zhuang lived through the collapse of the Tang and served the state of Former Shu as chief minister. He is known for his long narrative poem on the Huang Chao rebellion and for early ci (song lyrics).
Lifetime: c. 836–910. Other famous works: The Painting of Jinling (金陵图); Lament of the Lady of Qin (秦妇吟); Pusa Man (菩萨蛮).