Recorded Across Generations.
For Those Who Come After.
The body of a carp, fitted with a pair of bird's wings, grey-green markings, a white head, a red beak. It flies by night in great shoals, crossing from the eastern sea to the western, back and forth year upon year, and it never stops. Wherever it passes, that year's harvest comes in heavy without fail. The grain hangs thick and bends the stalks, the granaries fill. This age is used to omens of ill; it is the exception, for where it comes, a good year is near. Because it brings such fortune, hunters keep watch by the sea night after night, hoping to catch a single one. But it is always in transit, sweeping from east to west across the open water, and it is hard to find. Keep watch a whole month, and you may still not glimpse it once. Eat its heart, and you gain one year of good fortune. For that year all things go your way, as bountiful as the lands it passes over. Everyone covets the fortune it brings. No one asks what it wants. All it wants is to stay alive, to reach the next stretch of sea.
鲤鱼的身子，生着一对鸟的翅膀，苍青的斑纹，白头，红喙。它成群夜飞，自东海横渡向西海，年年往返，从不停歇。 但凡它飞过之处，那一年的收成必定丰足，谷穗沉甸甸压弯了秆，仓廪堆满。这世道见惯了凶兆，它却是个例外：它一来，便是丰年将至。 正因它带来这样的福泽，猎人便夜夜守在海边，只盼能猎得一条。只是它总在赶路，自东向西，飞掠于茫茫海面之上，踪影难觅，守上整整一月，也未必能见着一次。 食其心者，得一年的福运。这一年里，诸事顺遂，如它所过之地，岁岁丰稔。 人人都惦记它带来的福，却没人问过它要什么。它要的，不过是活着，飞过下一片海。
棲 觀水 The Guan River
是多文鰩魚，狀如鯉魚，魚身而鳥翼，蒼文而白首赤喙，常行西海，游於東海，以夜飛。