Reascending Chingkangshan

I have long aspired to reach for the clouds
And I again ascend Chingkangshan
Coming from afar to view our old haung,
I find new scenes replacing the old.
Everywhere orioles sing, swallows dart,
Steams babble
And the road mounts skyward.
Once Huangyangchieh is passed
No other perilous place calls for a glance.

Wind and thunder are stirring,
Flags and banners are flying
Wherever men live.
Thirty-eight years are fled
With a mere snap of the fingers.

We can clasp the moon in the Ninth Heaven
And seize turtles deep down in the Five Seas:
We’ll return amid triumphang song and laughter.
Nothing is hard in this world
If you dare to scale the heights.

- Mao Zedong, May 1965