Revisiting the Dream of the Peony Pavilion

Kunqu Opera Translations

Already the flowers bloom profusely

However, against the dilapidating well and fences

Such beautiful scenery cannot withstand time

Joyous encounters have no place in our garden

Clouds spread in the morning, beads of rain fall at dusk

Resplendent glow drift into bamboo windows

Silk threads of rain and gusts of wind

Painted boats on the misty ripples

Springtime wastes away for someone who passes her days behind silk screens!

Azaleas red as blood spill all over the verdant hills

Beyond the blackberry roses, willows sway as if intoxicated

The peony is fair indeed

But springtime passes soon

I gaze deeply

The swallows’ chatter is clear as scissors cut

Listen, the orioles’ song is mellow and full

Springtime this year stirs my heart more than ever

Its radiance cannot be withheld by these undulating walls

My heart brimming with love suspends, floats, diffuses

This sleepy blackberry rose entangling with my dress

Is comparable to my heart clinging to its beloved

Over there are the pond and rockery

Here is the peony pavilion

Peony shoots are framed in the balustrade

Locks of willow

Tresses of elmpods

are threaded together by spring

and dangle like gold coins

I couldn’t have deceived myself

Vaguely I still imagine his face

The encounter was brief

And his departure unwilling

He can’t be far yet

Our affair was just a instant ago

Perhaps he will appear again by these blossoms and willow

Yesterday and today

In my eyes and heart

This garden turned into a matrimonial bed

(This aria is about the plum tree by which Du Liniang met the scholar in her dream)

Its fragrance is pure and extends far

Its canopy is full and even

Thanks to this season of blossoms and abundant rain

The leaves are lush

The mellow fruits hold bitter kernels

How I love the shade it casts

In which I revisit my fleeting dream

In a fortuitous moment

My heart was tied to another

By this plum tree

If our love was as free as the love for flowers

If to live or to die became our own choice

There would be no heartache and laments

Until my soul melts into the plum tree’s roots

In the season of perennial rain

Alas my beloved

I will reside here

Until we meet again