Illumination

Tonight met old friends from the library for dinner and an author event featuring Nicholas Carr and Robin Sloan at the Campbell Heritage Theatre. The photos of the stage are unremarkable, but I loved the glass balls floating illuminated in the pool outside.


TAKING LEAVE OF A FRIEND

Blue mountains north of the walls,
White river winding about them;
Here we must make separation
And go out through a thousand miles of dead grass.
Mind like a floating white cloud,
Sunset like the parting of old acquaintances
Who bow over their clasped hands at a distance.
Our horses neigh to each other
       as we are departing.

Li Po (701-762) in the version by Ezra Pound 

in The New Directions Anthology of Classical Chinese Poetry, p. 82.