Sounds of Nature

隆隆溪水聲

桂源舖 南宋‧楊萬里

萬山不許一溪奔，攔得溪聲日夜喧，
到得前頭山腳盡，堂堂溪水出前村。

The ancient poet said it all. This is my story:

Rainstorm has returned to our area as it did last year about this time.
It is a nature thing, and I love it as I did last year and every year
during this time. The following note was what I posted in our class
website last year. It refreshes my thought about the sounds of nature:

“ After the rain showers, I like to get out of the house and revisit my
yard and garden. I notice the lawn getting greener and I see new
growth everywhere. Although we call them "weeds", I find them
actually charming and very pleasing, because they present to you
their best with various shapes, colors and styles.

While enjoying all these things in nature, I hear a rumbling sound
from the nearby creek (隆隆溪水聲). It is Redwood Creek (紅木溪),
which begins from far away where there are rolling hills and tall
redwood trees. Just before approaching the boundary behind my
backyard, the creek makes a sharp right angle turn, and then joins
with the Napa River a few miles down, and then continues to the
San Francisco Bay, where it meets the Pacific Ocean.

We recently had a rather severe rainstorm and so there is plenty
of runoff water. Although the rumbling sounds of Redwood Creek
are of no comparison to those of the Colorado River or the Yangtse,
I, however, can enjoy these ear-soothing sounds day and night,
without leaving my house. And that is another reason I like to stay
in my backyard as long as I have nothing else important to do. "

I love the sounds of nature, especially the "隆隆溪水聲".


PS

“萬山不許一溪奔 “ is also the title name of a book published in
Taipei years ago. It is a “胡適雷震來往書信選集”. As we know,
in the 1950s, through his “自由中國半月刊”, 雷震 had all his
"潺潺溪水聲", which the KMT found to be not soothing at all.
It actually ended up with jail term for 雷震.

The comparison of 〔“萬山” vs “一溪”〕 and 〔 KMT vs 雷震 〕
is obvious.

Yeh Tze