Home › Poems › Early Spring Excursion

Hé Jìn Líng Lù Chéng Zǎo Chūn Yóu WàngEarly Spring Excursion 和晋陵陆丞早春游望

Du Shenyan (杜审言, also known as Tu Shen-yen)｜Early Tang｜five-character regulated verse

Du Shenyan on early spring south of the Yangtze: plum and willow cross the river.

Original Chinese text with pinyin

云霞出海曙
yún xiá chū hǎi shǔ

梅柳渡江春
méi liǔ dù jiāng chūn

Simplified characters; traditional title: 和晉陵陸丞早春遊望. This is a long poem; only the best-known lines are shown, and “……” marks omitted passages.

Note on the text: This page presents a well-known excerpt; the full poem is longer in the traditional corpus.

Clouds and dawn colours come out of the sea;

plum and willow cross the river, and it's spring.

Original translation by Poetune — literal but poetic, written for this site.

云霞出海曙 · yún xiá chū hǎi shǔ — Clouds and dawn colours come out of the sea;

梅柳渡江春 · méi liǔ dù jiāng chūn — plum and willow cross the river, and it's spring.

Du Shenyan on early spring south of the Yangtze: plum and willow cross the river. The scene stays with you.

Du Shenyan on early spring south of the Yangtze: plum and willow cross the river.

Du Shenyan, grandfather of Du Fu, helped shape regulated verse.

Lifetime: c. 645–c. 708. Other famous works: Early Spring Excursion (和晋陵陆丞早春游望).