<Header>
<Author: 白居易>
<Title: 臨水坐>
<Format: 七言絕句>
<Year: 2000>
<BookName: Po Chu-I Selected Poems>
<Translator: BURTON WATSON>
<TranslatedTitle: Sitting by the Water>
<BookPage: 85>
<UsedPage: 1>
<Feature: 0>
<End Header>
<Poem>
昔為東掖垣中客，
今作西方社內人。
手把楊枝臨水坐，
閒思往事似前身。
<End Poem>
<Translation>
Once a sojourner within east palace walls,
now memeber of a religious group of the Western Region─
a willow branch in hand, I sit by the water
quietly recalling past affairs─as though from a former existence.
<End Translation>