By the stream a willow stem up top down,
Tender the twigs leaning toward the water:
The leaves brushing the rippling waves and speak,
The sound’s too sharp to hear and understand.
A shrouded mystery of up and down,
We rise from sleep by habit looking up;
Yet our livelihood from within the ground,
The water, the grain, the fishes at sea.
And the current of life flows in the stream,
Generations trembling from our gossip,
When the leaves and the purling waves echo,
A reeling image talking in a dream.
A supernal story unheard before,
Of the inane being hung up unbound,
Without a pedestal to stand upon,
A perplexity, on the screen of time.
And the charm of the divine creation,
The perfection of the design ordained,
Of the shapes, up whirling in space, flashing
Rays of fire, protecting life by the flame.
A shrouded mystery of up and down,
Being the top secret of the willow,
Remains the voice uttered by the image,
Mirrored in the waves, talking in a dream.