<Header>
<Author: 白居易>
<Title: 秦中吟十首　買花>
<Format: 五言古詩>
<Year: 1947>
<BookName: THE WHITE PONY: An Anthology of Chinese Poetry from the Earliest Times to the Present Day, Newly Translated>
<Translator: Robert Payne>
<TranslatedTitle: BUYING FLOWERS>
<BookPage: 223>
<UsedPage: 1>
<Feature: 0>
<End Header>
<Poem>
帝城春欲暮，
喧喧車馬度。
共道牡丹時，
相隨買花去。
貴賤無常價，
酬直看花數。
灼灼百朵紅，
箋箋五束素。
上張幄幕庇，
旁織巴籬護。
水灑復泥封，
移來色如故。
家家習為俗，
人人迷不悟。
有一田舍翁，
偶來買花處。
低頭獨長歎，
此歎無人喻。
一叢深色花，
十戶中人賦。
<End Poem>
<Translation>
In the capital Spring comes late:
The noisy chariots and horses are passing.
They say, "It is the time of the peonies".
So they come together to buy flowers.
Prices, high and low, may change,
But also it depends on how much you buy.
Hundreds shine bright red,
There is a bouquet white as crystal,
Sheltered by curtains overhead
And constructed on a bamboo framework,
Watered and set in mud.
These are the old colours, but changed:
Every house buys them according to custom,
And nobody thinks wrong of it.
Only an old man from the farm
Coming by chance to the flower-market
Lowers his head, deeply sighs—
A sigh which no one understands.
Over a single posy of deep-coloured flowers
Ten common families might sing!
<End Translation>