O Pequeno Discípulo Taoísta do Início

Mount Taiyi stands near the imperial capital, its linked peaks reaching toward the edge of the sea.
White clouds close together when viewed from afar; emerald mists vanish when one draws near.
The landscape shifts between the central peaks, while light and shadow differ from valley to valley.
Wishing to find shelter among human dwellings, I question a woodcutter across the stream.

…

With just a few lines, Wang Wei’s poem “Mount Zhongnan” brings before the reader the magnificent scenery of Zhongnan: clear mountains and limpid waters, secluded valleys and deep clouds. Mount Zhongnan is also known as Mount Taiyi, Mount Lungfei, Mount Zhongnan, or Mount Zhounan, and is commonly called Southern Mountain.

It is the very “Southern Mountain” mentioned in the birthday blessing, “May your fortune be as vast as the Eastern Sea, and your longevity as enduring as Southern Mountain!”

Since the pre-Qin era, Mount Zhongnan has been associated with legends of cultivators. Quite a few Taoist temples belonging to the Tang-era Louguan tradition still remain there, and the Complete Reality School, hailed in the present age as the orthodox lineage of the Taoist world, is likewise situated amid these emerald mountains and verdant valleys.

Seen from above, a mountain road wound along a stream, threading its way through mist and dense forest. Beyond the mountains lay fields dotted with crops. At the end of the road stood a Taoist temple of no particularly grand size.

Several narrow paths branched out from the temple. One of them led to a pavilio