Ink Falls on Lin Shu

The carefree little princess arrived in splendid finery, and left just the same;

The young prince, who had endured endless humiliation, arrived covered in grime, and would remain so for all eternity;

Childhood sweethearts, national enmity and family feuds, a love that could not be severed.

Until that day on the city wall, when she asked you to let her go, and to let yourself go too;

You could not catch her colorful silk sash as it drifted away. With the realm in your hands, you became a wise ruler, yet no one knew your wife was dead;

Even at the end of the Yellow Springs, she wanted never to see you again. She drifted away on the wind, never to be reborn, and no one knew the depths of her love and hate.

Love means parting, hatred is hard to undo, affection never ends,

And so the ink fell upon the snow.