第三十一章
DEDICATED TO THE RIVERS OF THIS WORLD
I avow
I have sung in praise of you
As I have sung in praise of the land and living things
I know not how many poets and wise men
In this world
Have praised you, each in his own script
I know not how many poems
Have entered humanity抯 canon
Because of your existence
Truthfully I am not the first
To liken you to a mother
But your milk still nurtures the broad land
And all the people living on it
As it did thousands of years ago
I avow
It was you who created the earliest myths
And with your invisible hands
Began tilling soil along the golden banks
Believe it, all of human civilization
Has been filled with boundless life-force
Only because of nurturing rivers
We hold rivers in awe, because rivers are a symbol
A river抯 honored name is like an epic
A truthful record of human progress and calamity
When we salute civilization
We are really saluting those great rivers
Our wisdom was given us by rivers
Rivers carried language and culture from other races
Likewise it was rivers that gave us
Variety of beliefs and ways of life
I avow, rivers, that your loveliness is beyond compare
Like a sleeping maiden
As you pass through dreamy fields
In truth you have given us poetry and love
Believe it, in the hearts of a host of peoples