Calligraphy translation

[Jonas06]

Originally Posted by berrypie

As Sashimister has already mentioned, this 2 lines are quoted from a Chinese poet named Li Bai (around the 7th century). He went to a place called Lu Shan and wrote this poem to express his astonishment at the beautiful scene of the waterfalls.

飛流直下三千尺
飛流直下 refers to the motion of the waterfalls
飛流=flying and flowing; 直下=straightly down into
三千尺 = 3000 feet
This sentence describes the rapid drop in elevation of the water flow

疑是銀河落九天
疑是 as if
銀河 the Milky way
落 drops/falls into
九天 the Heaven (an ancient Chinese word for Heaven)
This sentence could be translated into something like "As if the Milky way falling from the Heaver high above"

Hope it helps.

That does help. Thank you!

This still confuses me though. As you mentioned it is just two lines of the poem. I learned that there are two preceding lines before the latter two that you kindly translated for me. Is this a common practice, or is the work I have the second half of a series?

[berrypie]

Originally Posted by Jonas06

That does help. Thank you!

This still confuses me though. As you mentioned it is just two lines of the poem. I learned that there are two preceding lines before the latter two that you kindly translated for me. Is this a common practice, or is the work I have the second half of a series?

In this case, I would say the one who wrote you this calligraphy love these two lines so he/she quoted it out. And actually these 2 lines are the core of the poem. Generally people clearly remember the "core" of the poem but forget the rest Just like me, I never remember how to write the first 2 lines of this poem.

It's pretty common to quote a line or 2 from a poem when people doing calligraphy.

[Jonas06]

Originally Posted by berrypie

In this case, I would say the one who wrote you this calligraphy love these two lines so he/she quoted it out. And actually these 2 lines are the core of the poem. Generally people clearly remember the "core" of the poem but forget the rest Just like me, I never remember how to write the first 2 lines of this poem.

It's pretty common to quote a line or 2 from a poem when people doing calligraphy.

Thanks for clearing that up, Berrypie, along with all your help! And with a poem as beautiful as that, I don't think anyone will blame you for only remembering the core part of it, the well of such moving sentiments and imagery. Be well.