駕雲東歸 The Flight Home
悟空謝了，即抽身，捻著訣，丟個連扯，縱起斤斗雲，徑回東勝。那裡消一個時辰，早看見花果山水簾洞。美猴王自知快樂，暗暗的自稱道：悟空谢了，即抽身，捻着诀，丢个连扯，纵起斤斗云，径回东胜。那里消一个时辰，早看见花果山水帘洞。美猴王自知快乐，暗暗的自称道：
悟空按下雲頭，直至花果山，找路而走。悟空按下云头，直至花果山，找路而走。
逐句解 Line by line
Wukong gave his thanks, then drew himself away, made the hand-sign, gave a connected tumble, sprang up on the somersault-cloud, and headed straight back to the Eastern Continent.
丟個連扯 is to toss off a connected tumble — the very motion the master mocked him for and then built into a power. He leaves on the thing he was laughed at for. 抽身 is to take one's leave, 縱起 to spring up, 徑回 to go straight back.
It hardly took an hour before he sighted the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit and the Water-Curtain Cave.
那裡消一個時辰 — it hardly took a 時辰, one of the twelve double-hours, so roughly two of ours. Set that against the outward journey: a bamboo raft, two oceans, and the better part of a decade. 那 is nǎ in its rhetorical use. (一個 is yí gè.)
The Handsome Monkey King, glad in himself, said quietly to himself:
自知快樂, glad within himself, and 暗暗的自稱, saying it quietly to himself. The poem that follows is not addressed to anybody. He is alone in the sky, and pleased.
When I left, my mortal bones and flesh were heavy;
凡骨凡胎 — mortal bones and mortal flesh — and the operative word is 重 (zhòng), heavy.
having gained the Way, my body is light, my frame light too.
And the answering word, twice over: 輕, light. Lightness is the standard outward sign of immortality in this tradition — 羽化, "feathering," the frame let go of by the earth — and here it is cashed out as sheer speed.
In all the world none will set his will to it;
舉世 is the whole world, 立志 is to set the will. And this is the poem's one piece of doctrine: nobody is willing.
set the will to cultivate the mystery, and the mystery clears of itself.
Set the will, and 玄自明, the mystery clears of itself. The claim is that the Way is not hidden or reserved for anyone — it is simply that almost nobody resolves on it. Coming from a creature who crossed two oceans on a raft to find a teacher, it is not an idle boast.
Back then, crossing the sea, the waves were hard to breast;
過海 reaches back to the bamboo raft of the first chapter, and 波難進 to every wave he had to get through on it.
today, returning, the going is wonderfully easy.
甚易行, and how easy the going is now. The whole force of the couplet is in the contrast.
The parting words and earnest charge are still in my ears —
叮嚀 (dīng níng) is an earnest charge, the kind repeated so that it sticks. 還在耳, still in his ears — the flaying and the ninefold dark were spoken minutes ago. He is delighted anyway.
who would have thought that in a moment I'd see the Eastern Sea!
何期, who would have thought; 頃刻, in an instant; 東溟, the Eastern Ocean. The poem's last line is pure astonishment at his own speed.
Wukong brought down his cloud, came straight to the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit, and went looking for the path.
按下雲頭 is to press the cloud down and land. And then 找路而走 — he has to go looking for the path. Twenty years is long enough to forget the way home.
Wukong's homeward poem measures the distance the Way has made, and its hinge is the body itself: 去時凡骨凡胎重，得道身輕體亦輕 — "when I left, my mortal bones and flesh were heavy; having gained the Way, my body is light." Lightness is the classic outward sign of immortality, the 羽化 or "feathering" by which the adept's frame is released from the earth, and here it is rendered as sheer speed. The outward voyage — the bamboo raft across the ocean in the first chapter — cost him the better part of a decade and fought him every wave of the way (過海波難進); the return takes one somersault and barely an hour (頃刻見東溟). The somersault-cloud has simply folded up the world that once held him at arm's length.
At the poem's centre sits its one piece of doctrine, and it is the cultivation tradition's favourite truth: 舉世無人肯立志，立志修玄玄自明 — "in all the world none will set his will to it; set the will, and the mystery clears of itself." The Way is not esoteric or reserved; it is simply that almost nobody resolves on it. Wukong, who did resolve — the restless stone monkey who crossed an ocean to find a teacher — is the living proof, and the verse lets him say so. Underneath the triumph, though, the parting is still audible: 別語叮嚀還在耳, "the parting words and earnest charge are still in my ears." The master's terrible warning is minutes old, and the reader, unlike the exultant monkey, can hear the irony waiting at the bottom of the chapter. Trouble is exactly what he is flying home toward.