Montagne déserte. Personne n’est en vue.
Seuls, les échos des voix résonnent, au loin.
Ombres retournent dans la forêt profonde:
Dernier éclat de la mousse, vert.
— FRANÇOIS CHENG, 1977
(Cheng, L’écriture poétique chinoise. In English: Chinese Poetic Writing, trans. Donald A. Riggs & Jerome P. Seaton.)
[Deer Enclosure. Deserted mountain. No one in sight. / Only, the echoes of voices resound, far off. / Shadows return to the deep forest: / Last gleaming of the moss, green.]
Cheng writes, as translated by Riggs:
[Wang] describes here a walk on the mountain, which is at the same time a spiritual experience, an experience of the Void and of communion with Nature. The first couplet should be interpreted “On the empty mountain I meet no one; only some echoes of voices of people walking come to me.” But through the suppression of the personal pronoun and of locative elements the poet identifies himself immediately with the “empty mountain,” which is therefore no longer merely a “complement of place”; similarly, in the third line he is the ray of the setting sun that penetrates the forest. From the point of view of content, the first two lines present the poet as still “not seeing”; in his ears the echoes of human voices still resound. The last two lines are centered in the theme of “vision”: to see the golden effect of the setting sun on the green moss. Seeing here signifies illumination and deep communion with the essence of things. Elsewhere the poet often omits the personal pronoun to effect the description of actions in sequence where human acts are related to movements in nature.
Cheng also presents a literal translation of the poem:
Montagne vide / ne percevoir personne
Seulement entendre / voix humaine résonner
Ombre-retournée / penetrer forêt profonde
Encore luire / sur la mousse verte
It is curious to see how Cheng poeticizes and even Westernizes his literal version to create a finished translation. The Buddhist montagne vide (empty mountain) becomes the Romantic montagne déserte (deserted mountain). Échos and au loin (far off) are added to the second line. In the third, his literal ombre-retournée (returned shadow — a trope he notes as meaning “rays of sunset”) has become a subject and verb, ombres retournent (shadows return) which considerably alters the meaning. Cheng’s last line is quite peculiar: the literal Encore luire sur la mousse verte (to shine again on the green moss) becomes Dernier eclat de la mousse, vert (last gleaming of the moss, green — the green referring to the gleaming, not the moss). The line owes more to French Symbolists than to Tang Buddhists.
Translations aside, Cheng’s book is a luminous, original study of Chinese poetry. In the English version, first published in 1982, Jerome P. Seaton, working “after the interpretations of” Cheng, offers a translation that seems to owe more to Gary Snyder’s 1978 poem (#19) than to Cheng:
Empty mountain. None to be seen.
But hear, the echoing of voices.
Returning shadows enter deep, the grove.
Sun shines, again, on lichen’s green.