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Well loaded with millet were the dishes, |
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And long and curved were spoons of thorn-wood. |
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The way to Zhou was like a whetstone, |
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And straight as an arrow. |
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[So] the officers trod it, |
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And the common people looked on it. |
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When I look back and think of it, |
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My tears run down in streams. |
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In the States of the east, large and small, |
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The looms are empty. |
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Thin shoes of dolichos fibre, |
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Are made to serve to walk on the hoar-frost. |
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Slight and elegant gentlemen, |
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Walk along that road to Zhou. |
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Their going and coming, |
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Makes my heart ache. |
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Ye cold waters, issuing variously from the spring, |
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Do not soak the firewood I have cut. |
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Sorrowful I awake and sigh; -- |
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Alas for us toiled people! |
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The firewood has been cut; -- |
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Would that it were conveyed home! |
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Alas for us the toiled people! |
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Would that we could have rest! |
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The sons of the east, |
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Are only summoned [to service], without encouragement; |
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While the sons of the west, |
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Shine in splendid dresses. |
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The sons of boatmen, |
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Have furs of the bear and grisly bear. |
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The sons of the poorest families, |
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Form the officers in public employment. |
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If we present them with spirits, |
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They do not look on them as liquor. |
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If we give them long girdle-pendants with their stones, |
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They do not think them long enough. |
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There is the milky way in heaven, |
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Which looks down on us in light; |
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And the three stars together are the Weaving Sisters, |
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Passing in a day through seven stages [of the sky]. |
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Although they go through their seven stages, |
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They complete no bright work for us. |
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Brilliant shine the Draught Oxen, |
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But they do not serve to draw our carts. |
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In the east there is Lucifer; |
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In the west there is Hesperus; |
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Long and curved is the Rabbit Net of th esky; -- |
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But they only occupy their places. |
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In the south is the Sieve, |
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But it is of no use to sift. |
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In the north is the Ladle, |
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But it lades out no liquor. |
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In the south is the Sieve, |
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Idly showing its mouth. |
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In the north is the Ladle, |
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Raising its handle in the west. |