(no subject)

 today in not-great-translations of poetry from the shijing: 

手如柔荑，肤如凝脂，领如蝤蛴，齿如瓠犀，螓首蛾眉，巧笑倩兮，美目盼兮。

hands like tender sprouts
skin like solidified lard
neck like roundhead borers
teeth like gourd seeds
cicada temples moth brows
lovely smile dimpling held
beautiful gaze pupils clear 
--国风·卫风·硕人 Guo feng, wei feng, shuo ren [Odes of Wei, - uh, tol/buff lady]

ngl I feel it's probably better to go straight for the scientific names, bc then at least it sounds wacky but in a consistent way (in context, some of those are regularly seen phrases today, it's just 'neck like the crooked larvae of longhorn beetles" that's tripping me up) now that I've checked two real translations, they kept the larvae \o/  

more context: description of the wedding of noblewoman Zhuang Jiang, a princess of Qi who married to Wei, and a poet as well - she has five works in the shijing. also this passage is......one of THE classical....descriptions of beauties, given the pedigree from the book of poetry..........................................

............anyway I'm most upset about the hands like soft baby cogongrass plants. do they mean...snappable? not yet full of chlorophyll??