A Record of Washing Swords in the Sea of Officials

Song of the Peach Blossom Hermitage

Tang Yin, Ming Dynasty

In the Peach Blossom Hollow stands the Peach Blossom Hermitage; beneath it lives the Peach Blossom Immortal.

The Peach Blossom Immortal plants peach trees, then sells the blossoms to pay for wine.

Sober, he sits beneath the flowers; drunk, he sleeps beneath them.

Day after day, beneath the blossoms and behind them; year after year, drunk and sober.

He would rather die among flowers and wine than bow before carriages and horses.

The wealthy delight in the dust kicked up by hooves; the poor find their good fortune in wine cups and flowering branches.

Set riches against poverty, and one lies on the ground while the other reaches the heavens.

Set poverty against carriages and horses: they must toil on the road, while I enjoy my leisure.

The world laughs and calls me mad; I laugh at the world for failing to see.

Remember the graves of the heroes of Wuling: now without wine or flowers, they have been plowed into fields.