Returning from lotus gathering, green water, lotus robes, autumn wind stirs waves, ducks and geese fly.
Cassia oars, orchid sculls descend the long shore, silk skirts, jade wrists sway the light oar.
Leaf isles, flower pools stretch to a flat horizon, river songs, Yue flutes, the bitterness of longing.
The bitterness of longing, sweet meetings cannot stay.
The warrior beyond the frontier has not yet returned, south of the river, lotus gathering now ends at dusk.
Now ends at dusk, plucking lotus flowers, must they all be from singing houses?
On the official road south of the city, holding mulberry leaves, how does it compare to gathering lotus on the river?
Lotus flowers upon lotus flowers, how the blooms and leaves overlap.
The leaf's green shames the eyebrow, the flower's red rivals the cheek.
The fair one not at this appointed time, sadly gazing at the hour of parting.
Pulling the flower, I pity the shared stem; breaking the lotus root, I love the connecting threads.
Where is the old affection? The new things only flourish in vain.
I do not regret untying the shared pendant at South Ford, but still blush at the delayed goose-message from North Sea.
The lotus-gathering song has its rhythm, lotus gathering at night does not cease.
Just as I meet the vast wind on the river, and again encounter the lingering moon on the river.
Meeting by night at the lotus shore, the Wu maids and Yue girls, how luxuriant!
Together they ask, beyond the cold river a thousand miles away, how many more passes and mountains for the traveling man?