... After all, they pay me pretty well to teach supply and demand and regression discontinuity and write my little papers. Then again, the ghost of Cold Mountain can take some comfort in the likelihood that another thousand years from now, not just the homeless dogs but the clever computers who succeed us will probably still be reading his wry poems, translated to some machine language they understand. For now, Burton Watson will do quite well.
By Cold Mountain (Han-shan), translated by Burton Watson.
Here we languish, a bunch of poor scholars,
Battered by extremes of hunger and cold.
Out of work, our only joy is poetry:
Scribble, scribble we wear out our brains.
Who will read the works of such men?
On that point you can save your sighs.
We could inscribe our poems on biscuits
And homeless dogs wouldn't deign to nibble.
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