Du Fu.  A Woman Of Quality.

Du Fu. A Woman Of Quality.

Author: The Ceylon Press September 27, 2025 Duration: 2:37

 
Matchless in breeding and beauty, 
a fine lady has taken refuge 
in this forsaken valley. 
She is of good family, she says, 
but her fortune has withered away; 
now she lives as the grass and trees. 
When the heartlands fell to the rebels 
her brothers were put to death;
birth and position availed nothing--
she was not even allowed
to bring home their bones for burial.
The world turns quickly against
those who have had their day--
fortune is a lamp-flame
flickering in the wind.
Her husband is a fickle fellow
who has a lovely new woman.
Even the vetch-tree is more constant,
folding its leaves every dusk,
and mandarin ducks
always sleep with their mates.
But he has eyes only
for his new woman's smile,
and his ears are deaf
to his first wife's weeping.
High in the mountains
spring water is clear as truth,
but when it reaches the lowlands
it is muddied with rumor.
Her serving-maid returns
from selling her pearls;
she drags a creeper over
to cover holes in the roof.
The flowers the lady picks
are not for her hair,
and the handfuls of cypress
are a bitter stay against hunger.
Her pretty blue sleeves
are too thin for the cold;
as evening falls
she leans on the tall bamboo.

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The Ceylon Press publishes a range of podcasts including The History Of Sri Lanka; the off-grid Jungle Diaries podcast; Island Stories, the podcast that explores what makes Sri Lanka, Sri Lankan; the Wild Isle Podcast: Stories from Sri Lanka’s Nature; a range of complete Audio Books about Sri Lanka; as well as Poetry from The Jungle.  All these, along with eBooks, dictionaries, guides and companions can be found at www.theceylonpress.com, based at The Flame Tree Estate & Hotel in the jungle northwest of Kandy: www.flametreeestate.com.  

The copyright of this podcast recording is David Swarbrick @The Ceylon Press 2025. 

POETRY FROM THE JUNGLE GRATEFULLY ACKNOWLEDGES THE COPYRIGHT CREDIT: 
Du Fu (Chinese lived from 712. Copyright © 2008 - 2025 The National Museum of Language 


There’s a particular sound to the jungle-a layered quiet of leaves, birds, and distant water. It’s from within that atmosphere that The Sri Lanka Podcast: Poetry From The Jungle finds its voice. Produced by The Ceylon Press, each episode is recorded at the Flame Tree Estate & Hotel, nestled in the wilds northwest of Kandy. This isn’t a standard literary analysis show; it’s an experience of resonance. Here, timeless poems by renowned authors are read aloud, allowing their rhythms and meanings to intertwine with the ambient sounds of a Sri Lankan forest. The setting does more than provide backdrop-it actively shapes how you hear each word, offering a fresh and quietly profound perspective on verses you thought you knew. This podcast invites a slower kind of listening, where a classic sonnet might be punctuated by a monsoon shower or the call of a hornbill. It’s for anyone who believes place matters, that the environment where a story is told becomes part of the story itself. Tune in for a unique fusion of the literary and the natural, a deliberate retreat into the world of spoken art framed by one of the planet’s most vibrant soundscapes.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 89

The Sri Lanka Podcast: Poetry From The Jungle
Podcast Episodes
Anna Akhmatova.  Poem Without a Hero. [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 5:02
I have lit my treasured candles, one by one, to hallow this night. With you, who do not come, I wait the birth of the year. Dear God! the flame has drowned in crystal, and the wine, like poison, burns Old malice bites th…
Alun Lewis.  All Day It Has Rained. [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 2:57
All day it has rained, and we on the edge of the moors Have sprawled in our bell-tents, moody and dull as boors, Groundsheets and blankets spread on the muddy ground And from the first grey wakening we have found No refu…
Allen Ginsberg.  My Sad Self. [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 3:56
Sometimes when my eyes are red I go up on top of the RCA Building and gaze at my world, Manhattan— my buildings, streets I’ve done feats in, lofts, beds, coldwater flats —on Fifth Ave below which I also bear in mind, its…
Abu Nuwas.  In The Bath-House. [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:26
In the bath-house, the mysteries hidden by trousersAre revealed to you.All becomes radiantly manifest.Feast your eyes without restraint!You see handsome buttocks, shapely trim torsos,You hear the guys whispering pious fo…
Catullus.  Poem 5. [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:35
Let us live, my Lesbia, and love,and the rumors of rather stern old menlet us value all at just one penny!Suns may set and rise again;for us, when once the brief light has set,an eternal night must be slept.Give me a tho…
Andrew Marvell.  To His Coy Mistress. [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 3:14
Had we but world enough and time,This coyness, lady, were no crime.We would sit down, and think which wayTo walk, and pass our long love’s day.Thou by the Indian Ganges’ sideShouldst rubies find; I by the tideOf Humber w…
Breyten Breytenbach.  A Footnote Under The Night Of History. [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 2:59
in the night when everything was blackburnt to a cross of ashon the blind glassand the dog’s bark a dark kiteblowing away in darkness to where the moontears like the keel of a sinking boatI dreamt my languagethe title pa…
Alun Lewis.  The Jungle. [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 6:56
The Ceylon Press publishes a range of podcasts including The History Of Sri Lanka; the off-grid Jungle Diaries podcast; Island Stories, the podcast that explores what makes Sri Lanka, Sri Lankan; the Wild Isle Podcast: S…