The poem are selected from the Book of Poetry which is written in about 500~550 A.D.
The original name is “诗经：氓”.
Chapter One #
A man looks attractive comes to me,
swap my silk with his cloth.
But he doesn’t want the silk,
he wants me.
I’m about to accompany with him to the River Qi when he leave,
but I keep going until Hill Dunqu.
I don’t want to delay our marriage inside my heart,
but you(the man) never make a formal propose.
Please don’t be angry,
I promise you autumn is our time.
Chapter Two #
I miss you so sick,
I stand in the city wall to look for you,
I can feel my smile so bright when I find you,
I can also feel my pain if you don’t appear.
You ask for fortune-teller to divine our future, It’s bright,
so I enter your carriage and get married without doubt.
Chapter Three #
When the leaf of mulberry tree hasn’t withered,
it looks colorful.
(When I’m still young, I looks beautiful.)
Turtledove, don’t eat too much mulberry fruit.
Girl, don’t fall too deep in love.
(Chinese myth says the turtledove will get poisoning when it eat too much mulberry fruit, perhaps the girl should not fall in love too quickly, it’s the poison)
If a man fall in love, he can still leave,
if a woman fall in love, she will get trapped.
(In the traditional Chinese society, if a woman has married with someone, she is hard to remarry with someone else when divorced, the situation of man is totally different)
Chapter Four #
Now the leafs of mulberry has withered,
they fall down from the limb.
Since I came to your family,
my life became poor.
River Qi runs day and night,
it wets the curtain of my carriage (I decide to leave you).
I have no fault in my behavior,
but you are inconsistent.
Chapter Five #
After I become your wife, I work hard for our family;
I sleep late, I wake up early.
(however, we often have conflicts.)
Since the verbally abusive ends,
the violence starts.
Brothers are not wise enough,
laugh loudly at me.
I stay alone and calm down to consider about myself,
how sad I am!
Chapter Six #
River Qi looks so board, but it still has its border.
Swamp Xi looks so large, but is also has its end.
(so does our love.)
I remind of my warm family time,
when I was a little girl.
Even though once we own the swear and promise from each other,
we are apart now,
I will never think about our experience again,
it’s end.
Originally post in medium (2020-10-27T13:17:05) and modified some sentences, link attached as follow: A love story from distant eastern world