Up in heaven he scattered ten thousand flying clouds; down in the sea he stirred a thousand layers of waves.

The poem now runs through his record, and it starts at the top and the bottom of the world in one couplet. Both raids are real events earlier in the book: the wreck of the peach banquet, and the visit to the Dragon King that got him the iron rod.

Facing heaven he trusted his strength and fought the Heavenly King; he drove back a hundred and eight thousand generals.

將 is jiàng here, a general — a noun, not the jiāng that shoves an object in front of its verb. Seven of the chapter's thirty-two take it, and here the metre makes it plain. The Heavenly King he is boasting of driving back is Li Jing — who is about to walk into this chapter in person, and who will not remember the episode fondly.

By command he was styled Great Sage, the Handsome Monkey Sprite; in his hand he has always wielded the gold-banded rod.

大聖, Great Sage, is the title he extorted out of heaven rather than earned, and he has used it ever since as though it were a peerage. 中 is zhōng, in — in his hand.

Today in the west he puts forth all he can; back he comes into the cave to hold up Tripitaka.

The poem ends by turning the whole boast into service. Every feat listed above was rebellion; the last line spends all of it on carrying a monk. 扶 is to hold up, to support under the arm.