春夜喜雨 (Delightful Spring Night Rain)

— Du Fu (杜甫), 8th century Chinese poet

好雨知時節 當春乃發生

The good rain knows the season when it’s right
With spring upon us, timely does it tread

隨風潛入夜 潤物細無聲

It trails the wind, comes stealing in at night
Bedews all things with thin and soundless threads.

野徑雲俱黑 江船火獨明

Above the wild paths all the clouds are black
While lonely light on river barge does glow

曉看紅濕處 花重錦官城

At dawn the earth in spots is red and damp
On Citadel of Silk1 the blossoms blow.

  1. Jinguancheng, the Citadel of the Silk Service (锦官城), was a nickname for Chengdu (成都) in Sichuan for the silk management bureau in that city. A variation on this name was Jincheng, the Silk Citadel (锦城), which is the one I used for cadence in this translation. ↩︎