Language is the central subject of any discussion about translation. However, there are certain elements involved in the process of translation which go beyond this conventional area. This is especially true for literary translation in general and translation of poetry in particular.

According to Jackson, literary translation is a translational species in itself, but it “differs in many important respects from the kind of translation practiced in a language class. The literary translator is often not as much interested in literal ‘transliteration’ as in finding a corollary mood, tone, voice, sound, response, and so forth.

The process of translation is also an understanding process, namely the translator’s process of understanding of original work or authorship. The translator’s possession of identity requirements are not as simple as the readers that of general understanding of reading material, he should deal with the original text with nuanced understanding and comprehension, try to avoid for negligence in understanding that makes translation errors.

The translator’s understanding of the original text must reach the real author of depth; so that to shoulder the responsibility of faithfully and poetically express English poetry into Chinese. American poet Walt Whitman, (1819 ~ 1892), his Unseen Buds doesn’t like his other poetry that are spectacular.

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However, to savor the understanding, it is not difficult to find that internal rhythm of the poem is cadence dance together with poet’s careful and romantic inner heart. All literary arts are specific vivid art to reflect social life.

The artistic image of a poem, is a poet deep understanding on the basis of social reality, through the highly centralized and summarized to form, is of the poet’s emotional materialized and is the poet’s subjective feeling.

Therefore, the artistic image is the essence of poetry. When translating, it has to use visual translation technique, try to translate the atheistic beauty of the original poem so that reproduce the aesthetic meaning of artistic image and artistic conception of the source language.

In ancient Chinese poetry, poems that describe nature beauty hold quite a big component. Through vivid image, shaping the artistic conception in them, the poet also hopes to contain his own feelings as well as ideas.

There are disparities between one language and another. An excellent Poetry translation must reproduce the artistic beauty of the original one, and should be faithful to the original poem’s theme; it’s not just faithful to the literal meaning of words. Thus, in the process of translation, we need to have the closest understanding with the author, which is basic equivalence of understanding.