One man alone could hold it against a
thousand
and mow them down
like grass.
like grass.
Amy Lowell - Chinese Poets
" He waited
for four years, when it occurred to him to offer three _fu_ to the
Emperor. The event justified his temerity, and the poet was given a post
as one of the officials in the Chih Hsien library. This post he held for
four years, when he was appointed to a slightly better one at
Fêng-hsien. But, a year later, the An Lu-shan rebellion broke out, which
put a summary end to Tu Fu's position, whereupon he left Fêng-hsien and
went to live with a relative at the Village of White Waters. He was
still living there when the Emperor Ming Huang abdicated in favour of
his son, Su Tsung. If the old Emperor had given him an office, perhaps
the new one would; at any rate it was worth an attempt, for Tu Fu was in
dire poverty. Having no money to hire any kind of conveyance, he started
to walk to his destination, but fell in with brigands who captured him.
He stayed with these brigands for over a year, but finally escaped, and
at length reached Fêng Chiang, where the Emperor was in residence.
His appearance on his arrival was miserable in the extreme. Haggard and
thin, his shoulders sticking out of his coat, his rags literally tied
together, he was indeed a spectacle to inspire pity, and the Emperor at
once appointed him to the post of Censor. But this did not last long. He
had the imprudence to remonstrate with the Emperor anent the sentence of
banishment passed upon the general Tan Kuan. Considering that this
clever and extremely learned soldier had so far relaxed the discipline
of his army during one of the Northern campaigns that, one night, when
his troops were all peacefully sleeping in their chariots, the camp was
surrounded and burnt and his forces utterly routed, the punishment seems
deserved. But Tu Fu thought otherwise, and so unwisely urged his opinion
that the Emperor lost patience and ordered an investigation of Tu Fu's
conduct. His friends, however, rallied to his defence and the
investigation was quashed, but he was deprived of the censorship and
sent to a minor position in Shensi. This he chose to regard as a
punishment, as indeed it was. He proceeded to Shensi, but, on arriving
there, dramatically refused to assume his office; having performed which
act of bravado, he joined his family in Kansu. He found them in the
greatest distress from famine, and although he did his best to keep them
alive by going to the hills and gathering fire-wood to sell, and by
digging up roots and various growing things for them to eat, several of
his children died of starvation.
Another six months of minor officialdom in Hua Chou, and he retired to
Ch'êngtu in Szechwan, where he lived in a grass-roofed house, engaged in
study and the endeavour to make the two ends of nothing meet. At length,
a friend of his arrived in Szechwan as Governor-General, and this friend
appointed him a State Counsellor. But the grass-house was more to his
taste than state councils, and after a year and a half he returned to
it, and the multifarious wanderings which always punctuated his life.
Five years later, when he was fifty-five, he set off on one of his
journeys, but was caught by floods and obliged to take refuge in a
ruined temple at Hu Kuang, where he nearly starved before help could
reach him. After ten days, he was rescued through the efforts of the
local magistrate, but eating again after so long a fast was fatal and he
died within an hour.
Innumerable essays have been written comparing the styles of Li T'ai-po
and Tu Fu. Yüan Chên, a poet of the T'ang period, says that Tu Fu's
poems have perfect balance; that, if he wrote a thousand lines, the last
would have as much vigour as the first and that no one can equal him in
this, his poems make a "perfect circle. " He goes on: "In my opinion, the
great living wave of poetry and song in which Li T'ai-po excelled is
surpassed in Tu Fu's work, he is shoulder higher than Li Po. " Again:
"The poems of Li T'ai-po are like Spring flowers, those of Tu Fu are
like the pine-trees, they are eternal and fear neither snow nor cold. "
Shên Ming-chên says: "Li Po is like the Spring grass, like Autumn waves,
not a person but must love him. Tu Fu is like a great hill, a high peak,
a long river, the broad sea, like fine grass and bright-coloured
flowers, like a pine or an ancient fir, like moving wind and gentle
waves, like heavy hoar-frost, like burning heat--not a quality is
missing. "
Hu Yu-ling uses a metaphor referring to casting dice and says that Li
T'ai-po would owe Tu Fu "an ivory"; and Han Yü, speaking of both Li
T'ai-po and Tu Fu, declares that "the flaming light of their essays
would rise ten thousand feet. "
Poetic as these criticisms are, it is their penetration which is so
astonishing; but I think the most striking comparison made of Tu Fu's
work is that by Tao Kai-yu: "Tu Fu's poems are like pictures, like the
branches of trees reflected in water--the branches of still trees. Like
a large group of houses seen through clouds or mist, they appear and
disappear. "
Sometime ago, in a review of a volume of translations of Chinese poetry
in the London "Times," I came across this remarkable statement: "The
Chinese poet starts talking in the most ordinary language and voices the
most ordinary things, and his poetry seems to happen suddenly out of the
commonplace as if it were some beautiful action happening in the routine
of actual life. "
The critic could have had no knowledge of the Chinese language, as
nothing can be farther from the truth than his observation. It is
largely a fact that the Oriental poet finds his themes in the ordinary
affairs of everyday life, but he describes them in a very special,
carefully chosen, medium. The simplest child's primer is written in a
language never used in speaking, while the most highly educated scholar
would never dream of employing the same phrases in conversation which he
would make use of were he writing an essay, a poem, or a state document.
Each language--the spoken, the poetic, the literary, the
documentary--has its own construction, its own class of characters, and
its own symbolism. A translator must therefore make a special study of
whichever he wishes to render.
Although several great sinologues have written on the subject of Chinese
poetry, none, so far as I am aware, has devoted his exclusive attention
to the poetic style, nor has any translator availed himself of the
assistance, so essential to success, of a poet--that is, one trained in
the art of seizing the poetic values in fine shades of meaning. Without
this power, which amounts to an instinct, no one can hope to reproduce
any poetry in another tongue, and how much truer this is of Chinese
poetry can only be realized by those who have some knowledge of the
language. Such poets, on the other hand, as have been moved to make
beautiful renditions of Chinese originals have been hampered by
inadequate translations. It is impossible to expect that even a scholar
thoroughly versed in the philological aspects of Chinese literature can,
at the same time, be endowed with enough of the poetic _flair_ to
convey, uninjured, the thoughts of one poet to another. A second
personality obtrudes between poet and poet, and the contact, which must
be established between the two minds if any adequate translation is to
result, is broken. How Miss Lowell and I have endeavoured to obviate
this rupture of the poetic current, I shall explain presently. But, to
understand it, another factor in the case must first be understood.
It cannot be too firmly insisted upon that the Chinese character itself
plays a considerable part in Chinese poetic composition. Calligraphy and
poetry are mixed up together in the Chinese mind. How close this
intermingling may be, will appear when we come to speak of the "Written
Pictures," but even without following the interdependence of these arts
to the point where they merge into one, it must not be forgotten that
Chinese is an ideographic, or picture, language. These marvellous
collections of brushstrokes which we call Chinese characters are really
separate pictographic representations of complete thoughts. Complex
characters are not spontaneously composed, but are built up of simple
characters, each having its own peculiar meaning and usage; these, when
used in combination, each play their part in modifying either the sense
or the sound of the complex. Now it must not be thought that these
separate entities make an over-loud noise in the harmony of the whole
character. They are each subdued to the total result, the final meaning,
but they do produce a qualifying effect upon the word itself. Since
Chinese characters are complete ideas, it is convenient to be able to
express the various degrees of these ideas by special characters which
shall have those exact meanings; it is, therefore, clear that to grasp a
poet's full intention in a poem there must be a knowledge of the
analysis of characters.
This might seem bizarre, were it not for a striking proof to the
contrary. It is a fact that many of the Chinese characters have become
greatly altered during the centuries since they were invented. So long
ago as A. D. 200, a scholar named Hsü Shih, realizing that this
alteration was taking place, wrote the dictionary known as "Shuo Wên
Chieh Tzŭ," or "Speech and Writing: Characters Untied," containing about
ten thousand characters in their primitive and final forms. This work is
on the desk of every scholar in the Far East and is studied with the
greatest reverence. Many editions have appeared since it was written,
and by its aid one can trace the genealogy of characters in the most
complete manner. Other volumes of the same kind have followed in its
wake, showing the importance of the subject in Chinese estimation. While
translators are apt to ignore this matter of character genealogy, it is
ever present to the mind of the Chinese poet or scholar who is familiar
with the original forms; indeed, he may be said to find his overtones in
the actual composition of the character he is using.
All words have their connotations, but this is connotation and more; it
is a pictorial representation of something implied, and, lacking which,
an effect would be lost. It may be objected that poems were heard as
well as read, and that, when heard, the composition of the character
must be lost. But I think this is to misunderstand the situation.
Recollect, for a moment, the literary examinations, and consider that
educated men had these characters literally ground into them. Merely to
pronounce a word must be, in such a case, to see it and realize,
half-unconsciously perhaps, its various parts. Even if half-unconscious,
the _nuances_ of meaning conveyed by them must have hung about the
spoken word and given it a distinct flavour which, without them, would
be absent.
Now what is a translator to do? Shall he render the word in the flat,
dictionary sense, or shall he permit himself to add to it what it
conveys to an educated Chinese? Clearly neither the one nor the other in
all cases; but one _or_ the other, which the context must determine. In
description, for instance, where it is evident that the Chinese poet
used every means at his command to achieve a vivid representation, I
believe the original poem is more nearly reproduced by availing one's
self of a minimum of these "split-ups"; where, on the other hand, the
original carefully confines itself to simple and direct expression, the
word as it is, without overtones, must certainly be preferred. The
"split-ups" in these translations are few, but could our readers compare
the original Chinese with Miss Lowell's rendition of it, in these
instances, I think they would feel with me that in no other way could
the translation have been made really "literal," could the poem be
"brought over" in its entirety. If a translation of a poem is not poetry
in its new tongue, the original has been shorn of its chief reason for
being. Something is always lost in a translation, but that something had
better be the trappings than the essence.
I must, however, make it quite clear how seldom these "split-ups" occur
in the principal parts of the book; in the "Written Pictures," where the
poems were not, most of them, classics, we felt justified in making a
fuller use of these analytical suggestions; but I believe I am correct
in saying that no translations from the Chinese that I have read are so
near to the originals as these. Bear in mind, then, that there are not,
I suppose, more than a baker's dozen of these "split-ups" throughout the
book, and the way they were managed can be seen by this literal
translation of a line in "The Terraced Road of the Two-Edged Sword
Mountains. " The Chinese words are on the left, the English words on the
right, the analyses of the characters enclosed in brackets:
_Shang_ Above
_Tsê_ Then
_Sung_ Pines
_Fêng_ Wind
_Hsiao_ Whistling wind (Grass--meaning the sound of
wind through grass, to whistle; and in awe of,
or to venerate. )
_Sê_ Gusts of wind (Wind; and to stand. )
_Sê_ A psaltery (Two strings of jade-stones which
are sonorous. )
_Yü_ Wind in a gale (Wind; and to speak. )
Miss Lowell's rendering of the line was:
"On their heights, the wind whistles awesomely in the pines; it
booms in great, long gusts; it clashes like the strings of a
jade-stone psaltery; it shouts on the clearness of a gale. "
Can any one doubt that this was just the effect that the Chinese poet
wished to achieve, and did achieve by means of the overtones given in
his characters?
Another, simpler, example is in a case where the Chinese poet speaks of
a rising sun. There are many characters which denote sunrise, and each
has some shade of difference from every other. In one, the analysis is
the sunrise light seen from a boat through mist; in another, it is the
sun just above the horizon; still another is made up of a period of time
and a mortar, meaning that it is dawn, when people begin to work. But
the poet chose none of these; instead, he chose a character which
analyzes into the sun at the height of a helmeted man, and so Miss
Lowell speaks of the sun as "head-high," and we have the very picture
the poet wanted us to see.
Miss Lowell has told in the Preface the manner in which we worked. The
papers sent to Miss Lowell were in exactly the form of the above, and
with them I also sent a paraphrase, and notes such as those at the end
of this book. Far from making the slightest attempt at literary form in
these paraphrases, I deliberately made them as bald as possible, and
strove to keep my personality from intruding between Miss Lowell and the
Chinese poet with whose mood she must be in perfect sympathy. Her
remarkable gift for entering into the feeling of the poet she is
translating was first shown in "Six French Poets," but there she
approached her authors at first hand. It was my object to enable her to
approach these Chinese authors as nearly at first hand as I could. That
my method has been justified by the event, the book shows; not merely
are these translations extraordinarily exact, they are poetry, and would
be so though no Chinese poet had conceived them fourteen hundred years
ago. It is as if I had handed her the warp and the woof, the silver
threads and the gold, and from these she has woven a brocade as nearly
alike in pattern to that designed by the Chinese poet as the differences
in the looms permit. I believe that this is the first time that English
translations of Chinese poetry have been made by a student of Chinese
and a poet working together. Our experience of the partnership has
taught us both much; if we are pioneers in such a collaboration, we only
hope that others will follow our lead.
The second section of the book, "Written Pictures," consists of
illustrations, or half illustrations, of an art which the Chinese
consider the most perfect medium in which a man can express himself.
These _Tzŭ Hua_, "Hanging-on-the-Wall Poems," are less known and
understood than any other form of Oriental art. A beautiful thought
perpetuated in beautiful handwriting and hung upon the wall to suggest a
mental picture--that is what it amounts to.
In China, the arts of poetry and calligraphy are united in the
ideographs which form the written language. There are several different
styles in which these ideographs, or characters, may be written. The
earliest are pictograms known as the "ancient pictorial script," they
were superseded in the Eighth Century B. C. by the "great seal"
characters and later by the "lesser seal. " These, which had been
executed with the "knife pen," were practically given up when the
invention of the writing-brush, which is usually translated as "pencil,"
revolutionized calligraphy (_circa_ 215 B. C. ). Their place was taken by
a type of character known as "_li_" or "official script," a simplified
form of the "seal," and this, being an improvement upon all previous
styles, soon became popular. It created almost a new character in which
the pictorial element had largely disappeared, and, with certain
modifications, holds good to-day. The "model hand," the "running hand,"
and the famous "grass hand," so popular with poets and painters, are
merely adaptations of the _li_; all three of these, together with the
_li_ itself, are used in the composition of written pictures.
The written pictures here translated were formerly in the possession of
a Chinese gentleman of keenly æsthetic taste, and are excellent examples
of the art. A photograph of one of the originals will be found opposite
the translation made from it on page 170. The names which follow the
poems are not those of the authors, but of the calligraphists. In the
case of two poems, the authors' names are also given. These written
pictures had no titles, those given here were added simply for
convenience; but the titles to the poems in the body of the book are
those of the poets themselves, except in one or two instances where the
Chinese title conveyed so little to an Occidental mind that its meaning
had to be paraphrased.
The Notes at the end of the book are intended for the general reader.
For which reason, I have purposely excluded the type of note which
consists in cataloguing literary cross-allusions. To know that certain
lines in a poem are quoted from some earlier author, is one of a class
of facts which deeply interest scholars, but are of no importance
whatever to the rest of the world.
A word as to the title of this book: There lived at Ch'êng-tu, the
capital of Szechwan, early in the Ninth Century, a courtesan named Hsieh
T'ao, who was famous for her wit and verse-writing. Hsieh T'ao made a
paper of ten colours, which she dipped in a stream, and on it wrote her
poems. Now, some years before, a woman had taken the stole of a Buddhist
priest to this stream in order to wash it. No sooner had the stole
touched the water than the stream became filled with flowers. In an old
Chinese book, "The Treasury of Pleasant Records," it is told that, later
in life, Hsieh T'ao gave up the "fir-flower tablets" and made paper of a
smaller size. Presumably this fir-flower paper was the paper of ten
colours. The mountain stream which ran near Hsieh T'ao's house is called
the "Hundred Flower Stream. "
I cannot close this Introduction without expressing my gratitude to my
teacher, Mr. Nung Chu. It is his unflagging interest and never-failing
patience that have kept me spurred on to my task. Speaking no word of
English, Mr. Nung must often have found my explanations of what would,
and what would not, be comprehensible to Occidental readers very
difficult to understand, and my only regret is that he cannot read the
book now that it is done.
FIR-FLOWER TABLETS
SONGS OF THE MARCHES
BY LI T'AI-PO
I
It is the Fifth Month,
But still the Heaven-high hills
Shine with snow.
There are no flowers
For the heart of the earth is yet too chilly.
From the centre of the camp
Comes the sound of a flute
Playing "The Snapped Willow. "
No colour mists the trees,
Not yet have their leaves broken.
At dawn, there is the shock and shouting of battle,
Following the drums and the loud metal gongs.
At night, the soldiers sleep, clasping the pommels of their
jade-ornamented saddles.
They sleep lightly,
With their two-edged swords girt below their loins,
So that they may be able in an instant to rush upon the Barbarians
And destroy them.
II
Horses!
Horses!
Swift as the three dogs' wind!
Whips stinging the clear air like the sharp calling of birds,
They ride across the camel-back bridge
Over the river Wei.
They bend the bows,
Curving them away from the moon which shines behind them
Over their own country of Han.
They fasten feathers on their arrows
To destroy the immense arrogance of the foe.
Now the regiments are divided
And scattered like the five-pointed stars,
Sea mist envelops the deserted camp,
The task is accomplished,
And the portrait of Ho P'iao Yao
Hangs magnificently in the Lin Pavilion.
III
When Autumn burns along the hills,
The Barbarian hordes mount their horses
And pour down from the North.
Then, in the country of Han,
The Heavenly soldiers arise
And depart from their homes.
The High General
Divides the tiger tally.
Fight, Soldiers!
Then lie down and rest
On the Dragon sand.
The frontier moon casts the shadows of bows upon the ground,
Swords brush the hoar-frost flowers of the Barbarians' country.
The Jade Pass has not yet been forced,
Our soldiers hold it strongly.
Therefore the young married women
May cease their lamentations.
IV
The Heavenly soldiers are returning
From the sterile plains of the North.
Because the Barbarians desired their horses
To drink of the streams of the South,
Therefore were our spears held level to the charge
In a hundred fights.
In straight battle our soldiers fought
To gain the supreme gratitude
Of the Most High Emperor.
They seized the snow of the Inland Sea
And devoured it in their terrible hunger.
They lay on the sand at the top of the Dragon Mound
And slept.
All this they bore that the Moon Clan
Might be destroyed.
Now indeed have they won the right
To the soft, high bed of Peace.
It is their just portion.
THE BATTLE TO THE SOUTH OF THE CITY
BY LI T'AI-PO
How dim the battle-field, as yellow dusk!
The fighting men are like a swarm of ants.
The air is thick, the sun a red wheel.
Blood dyes the wild chrysanthemums purple.
Vultures hold the flesh of men in their mouths,
They are heavy with food--they cannot rise to fly.
There were men yesterday on the city wall;
There are ghosts to-day below the city wall.
Colours of flags like a net of stars,
Rolling of horse-carried drums--not yet is the killing ended.
From the house of the Unworthy One--a husband, sons,
All within earshot of the rolling horse-drums.
THE PERILS OF THE SHU ROAD
BY LI T'AI-PO
Alas! Alas! The danger! The steepness! O Affliction!
The Shu Road is as perilous and difficult as the way to the Green
Heavens.
No greater undertaking than this has been since Ts'an Ts'ung and Yü
Fu ruled the land.
For forty-eight thousand years no man had passed the boundary of
Ch'in.
Westward, over the Great White Mountain, was a bird-track
By which one could cross to the peak of Omei.
But the earth of the mountain fell and overwhelmed the Heroes so
that they perished.
Afterwards, therefore, they made sky-ladders and joined the cliffs
with hanging pathways.
Above, the soaring tips of the high mountains hold back the six
dragons of the sun;
Below, in the ravines, the flowing waters break into whirlpools and
swirl back against the current.
Yellow geese flying toward the peaks cannot pass over them;
The gibbons climb and climb, despairingly pulling themselves up
higher and higher, but even their endurance fails.
How the road coils and coils through the Green Mud Pass!
With nine turns to a hundred steps, it winds round the ledges of the
mountain crests.
Clutching at Orion, passing the Well Star, I look up and gasp.
I sit long with my hand pressed to my heart and groan.
I ask my Lord how long this Westward wandering will last, when we
shall return.
It is impossible to climb the terrible road along the edges of the
precipices.
Among the ancient trees, one sees only cruel, mournful, black birds.
Male birds, followed by females, fly to and fro through the woods.
Sometimes one hears a nightingale in the melancholy moonlight of the
lonely mountain.
The Shu Road is as perilous and difficult as the way to the Green
Heavens.
The ruddy faces of those who hear the story of it turn pale.
There is not a cubit's space between the mountain tops and the sky.
Dead and uprooted pine-trees hang over sheer cliffs.
Flying waterfalls and rolling torrents outdo one another in clamour
and confusion;
They dash against the perpendicular walls, whirl round ten thousand
rocks, and boom like thunder along the ravines.
This is what the Two-Edged Sword Mountains are like!
Alas! How endless a road for man to undertake! How came he to
attempt it!
The Terraced Road of the Two-Edged Sword twists between glittering
and rocky summits.
One man alone could hold it against a thousand and mow them down
like grass.
If the guardian of the Pass were doubtful whether those who came
were enemies of his kinsmen,
He could fall upon them as a ravening wolf.
At dawn, one flees the fierce tigers;
In the evening, one flees the long snakes
Who sharpen their fangs and suck blood,
Destroying men like hemp.
Even though the delights of the Embroidered City are as reported,
Nothing could equal the joy of going home at once.
The Shu Road is as perilous and difficult as the way to the Green
Heavens.
I turn toward the West, and, gazing long, I sigh.
LOOKING AT THE MOON AFTER RAIN
BY LI T'AI-PO
The heavy clouds are broken and blowing,
And once more I can see the wide common stretching beyond the four
sides of the city.
Open the door. Half of the moon-toad is already up,
The glimmer of it is like smooth hoar-frost spreading over ten
thousand _li_.
The river is a flat, shining chain.
The moon, rising, is a white eye to the hills;
After it has risen, it is the bright heart of the sea.
Because I love it--so--round as a fan,
I hum songs until the dawn.
THE LONELY WIFE
BY LI T'AI-PO
The mist is thick. On the wide river, the water-plants float
smoothly.
No letters come; none go.
There is only the moon, shining through the clouds of a hard,
jade-green sky,
Looking down at us so far divided, so anxiously apart.
All day, going about my affairs, I suffer and grieve, and press the
thought of you closely to my heart.
My eyebrows are locked in sorrow, I cannot separate them.
Nightly, nightly, I keep ready half the quilt,
And wait for the return of that divine dream which is my Lord.
Beneath the quilt of the Fire-Bird, on the bed of the Silver-Crested
Love-Pheasant,
Nightly, nightly, I drowse alone.
The red candles in the silver candlesticks melt, and the wax runs
from them,
As the tears of your so Unworthy One escape and continue constantly
to flow.
A flower face endures but a short season,
Yet still he drifts along the river Hsiao and the river Hsiang.
As I toss on my pillow, I hear the cold, nostalgic sound of the
water-clock:
Shêng! Shêng! it drips, cutting my heart in two.
I rise at dawn. In the Hall of Pictures
They come and tell me that the snow-flowers are falling.
The reed-blind is rolled high, and I gaze at the beautiful,
glittering, primeval snow,
Whitening the distance, confusing the stone steps and the courtyard.
The air is filled with its shining, it blows far out like the smoke
of a furnace.
The grass-blades are cold and white, like jade girdle pendants.
Surely the Immortals in Heaven must be crazy with wine to cause such
disorder,
Seizing the white clouds, crumpling them up, destroying them.
THE PLEASURES WITHIN THE PALACE
BY LI T'AI-PO
From little, little girls, they have lived in the Golden House.
They are lovely, lovely, in the Purple Hall.
They dress their hair with hill flowers,
And rock-bamboos are embroidered on their dresses of open-work silk
gauze.
When they go out from the retired Women's Apartments,
They often follow the Palace chairs.
Their only sorrow, that the songs and wu dances are over,
Changed into the five-coloured clouds and flown away.
THE YOUNG GIRLS OF YÜEH
BY LI T'AI-PO
I
Young girls are gathering lotus-seeds on the pond of Ya.
Seeing a man on the bank, they turn and row away singing.
Laughing, they hide among the lotus-flowers,
And, in a pretence of bashfulness, will not come out.
II
Many of the young girls of Wu are white, dazzlingly white.
They like to amuse themselves by floating in little boats on the
water.
Peeping out of the corners of their eyes, they spurn the Springtime
heart.
Gathering flowers, they ridicule the passer-by.
WRITTEN IN THE CHARACTER OF A BEAUTIFUL WOMAN GRIEVING BEFORE HER MIRROR
BY LI T'AI-PO
I
Bright, bright, the gilded magpie mirror,
Absolutely perfect in front of me on the jade dressing-stand.
Wiped, rubbed, splendid as the Winter moon;
Its light and brilliance, how clear and round!
The rose-red face is older than it was yesterday,
The hair is whiter than it was last year.
The white-lead powder is neglected,
It is useless to look into the mirror. I am utterly miserable.
II
When my Lord went away, he gave me this precious mirror coiled with
dragons
That I might gaze at my golden-threaded dress of silken gauze.
Again and again I take my red sleeve and polish the bright moon.
Because I love to see its splendour lighting up everything.
In its centre is my reflection, and the golden magpie which does not
fly away.
I sit at my dressing-stand, and I am like the green Fire-Bird who,
thinking of its mate, died alone.
My husband is parted from me as an arrow from the bowstring.
I know the day he left; I do not know the year when he will return.
The cruel wind blows--truly the heart of the Unworthy One is cut to
pieces.
My tears, like white jade chop-sticks, fall in a single piece before
the water-chestnut mirror.
SONGS TO THE PEONIES SUNG TO THE AIR: "PEACEFUL BRIGHTNESS"
BY LI T'AI-PO
I
The many-coloured clouds make me think of her upper garments, of her
lower garments;
Flowers make me think of her face.
The Spring wind brushes the blossoms against the balustrade,
In the heavy dew they are bright and tinted diversely.
If it were not on the Heaped Jade Mountain that I saw her,
I must have met her at the Green Jasper Terrace, or encountered her
by accident in the moon.
II
A branch of opulent, beautiful flowers, sweet-scented under frozen
dew.
No love-night like that on the Sorceress Mountain for these; their
bowels ache in vain.
Pray may I ask who, in the Palace of Han, is her equal?
Even the "Flying Swallow" is to be pitied, since she must rely upon
ever new adornments.
III
The renowned flower, and she of a loveliness to overthrow
Kingdoms--both give happiness.
Each receives a smile from the Prince when he looks at them.
The Spring wind alone can understand and explain the boundless
jealousy of the flower,
Leaning over the railing of the balcony at the North side of the
aloe-wood pavilion.
SPRING GRIEF AND RESENTMENT BY LI T'AI-PO
There is a white horse with a gold bridle to the East of the Liao
Sea.
Bed-curtains of open-work silk--embroidered quilt--I sleep with the
Spring wind.
The setting moon drops level to the balcony, it spies upon me. The
candle is burnt out.
A blown flower drifts in through the inner door--it mocks at the
empty bed.
THE CAST-OFF PALACE WOMAN OF CH'IN AND THE DRAGON ROBES
BY LI T'AI-PO
At Wei Yang dwells the Son of Heaven.
The all Unworthy One attends beside
The Dragon-broidered robes.
I ponder his regard, not mine the love
Enjoyed by those within the Purple Palace.
And yet I have attained to brightening
The bed of yellow gold.
If floods should come, I also would not leave.
A bear might come and still I could protect.
My inconsiderable body knows the honour
Of serving Sun and Moon.
I flicker with a little glow of light,
A firefly's. I beg my Lord to pluck
The trifling mustard plant and melon-flower
And not reject them for their hidden roots.
THE POET IS DETAINED IN A NANKING WINE-SHOP ON THE EVE OF STARTING ON A
JOURNEY
BY LI T'AI-PO
The wind blows. The inn is filled with the scent of willow-flowers.
In the wine-shops of Wu, women are pressing the wine. The sight
invites customers to taste.
The young men and boys of Nanking have gathered to see me off;
I wish to start, but I do not, and we drink many, many horn cups to
the bottom.
I beg them to look at the water flowing toward the East,
And when we separate to let their thoughts follow its example and
run constantly in my direction.
FÊNG HUANG T'AI
ASCENDING THE TERRACE OF THE SILVER-CRESTED LOVE-PHEASANTS AT THE CITY
OF THE GOLDEN MOUND
BY LI T'AI-PO
The silver-crested love-pheasants strutted upon the Pheasant
Terrace.
Now the pheasants are gone, the terrace is empty, and the river
flows on its old, original way.
Gone are the blossoms of the Palace of Wu and overgrown the road to
it.
Passed the generations of the Chin, with their robes and
head-dresses; they lie beneath the ancient mounds.
The three hills are half fallen down from Green Heaven.
The White Heron Island cuts the river in two.
Here also, drifting clouds may blind the Sun,
One cannot see Ch'ang An, City of Eternal Peace.
Therefore am I sorrowful.
THE NORTHERN FLIGHT
BY LI T'AI-PO
What hardships are encountered in a Northern flight!
We fly Northward, ascending the T'ai Hang Mountains.
The mountain road winds round a cliff, and it is very steep and
dangerous;
The precipice, sheer as though cut with a knife, rises to the great,
wide blue of the sky.
The horses' feet slip on the slanting ledges;
The carriage-wheels are broken on the high ridges;
The sand, scuffed into dust, floats in a continuous line to Yo Chou.
The smoke of beacon fires connects us with the Country of the North.
The spirit of killing is in the spears, in the cruel two-edged
swords.
The savage wind rips open the upper garments, the lower garments.
The rushing whale squeezes the Yellow River;
The man-eating beasts with long tusks assemble at Lo Yang.
We press forward with no knowledge of when we shall return;
We look back, thinking of our former home;
Grieving and lamenting in the midst of ice and snow;
Groaning aloud, with our bowels rent asunder.
A foot of cloth does not cover the body,
Our skins are cracked as the bark of a dead mulberry.
The deep gullies prevent us from getting water from the mountain
streams,
Far away are the slopes where we might gather grass and twigs for
our fires,
Then, too, the terrible tiger lashes his tail,
And his polished teeth glitter like Autumn frosts.
Grass and trees cannot be eaten.
We famish; we drink the drops of freezing dew.
Alas! So we suffer, travelling Northward.
I stop my four-horse carriage, overcome by misery.
When will our Emperor find a peaceful road?
When, before our glad faces, shall we see the Glory of Heaven?
FIGHTING TO THE SOUTH OF THE CITY
BY LI T'AI-PO
Last year they fought at the source of the Sang Ch'ien,
This year they fight on the road by the Leek-green River.
The soldiers were drenched by the waters of the Aral Sea,
The horses were turned loose to find grass in the midst of the snows
of the Heaven High Hills.
Over ten thousand _li_, they attacked and fought,
The three divisions are crumbled, decayed, utterly worn and old.
The Hsiung Nu use killing and slaughter in the place of the business
of plowing.
From ancient times, only dry, white bones are seen on the yellow
sand-fields.
The House of Ch'in erected and pounded firm the wall to make a
barrier before the dwelling-place of the Barbarians,
The House of Han still preserved the beacon-stands where fires are
lighted.
The lighting of beacon fires on the stands never ceases,
The fighting and attacking are without a time of ending.
In savage attack they die--fighting without arms.
The riderless horses scream with terror, throwing their heads up to
the sky.
Vultures and kites tear the bowels of men with their beaks
And fly to hang them on the branches of dead trees.
Officers and soldiers lying in mud, in grass, in undergrowth.
Helpless, the General--Yes, incapable before this!
We have learnt that soldiers are evil tools,
But wise men have not accomplished the ending of war, and still we
employ them.
THE CROSSWISE RIVER
BY LI T'AI-PO
I
There are people who say the Crosswise River is good;
I say the Crosswise River is terrible.
The savage wind blows as if it would overturn the Heaven's Gate
Mountains.
The white waves are as high as the high rooms in the Temple of Wa
Kuan.
II
The sea tide flowing Southward passes Hsün Yang.
From the beginning of things, the Ox Ledge has been more dangerous
than the Standing Horse Hill.
Those who wish to cross the Crosswise River
Find evil winds and waves.
The misery of that one stretch of water draws out its length to ten
thousand _li_.
III
When the Sea Demon passes by, a vicious wind curves back.
The waves beat open the rock wall of the Gate of Heaven.
Is the Eighth Month tide-bore of Chêkiang equal to this?
It seems as though the vast, booming waves were part of the
mountains--they spurt out snow.
ON HEARING THE BUDDHIST PRIEST OF SHU PLAY HIS TABLE-LUTE
BY LI T'AI-PO
The Priest of the Province of Shu, carrying his table-lute in a
cover of green, shot silk,
Comes down the Western slope of the peak of Mount Omei.
He moves his hands for me, striking the lute.
It is like listening to the waters in ten thousand ravines, and the
wind in ten thousand pine-trees.
The traveller's heart is washed clean as in flowing water.
The echoes of the overtones join with the evening bell.
I am not conscious of the sunset behind the jade-grey hill,
Nor how many and dark are the Autumn clouds.
CH'ANG KAN
BY LI T'AI-PO
When the hair of your Unworthy One first began to cover her
forehead,
She picked flowers and played in front of the door.
Then you, my Lover, came riding a bamboo horse.
We ran round and round the bed, and tossed about the sweetmeats of
green plums.
We both lived in the village of Ch'ang Kan.
We were both very young, and knew neither jealousy nor suspicion.
At fourteen, I became the wife of my Lord.
I could not yet lay aside my face of shame;
I hung my head, facing the dark wall;
You might call me a thousand times, not once would I turn round.
At fifteen, I stopped frowning.
I wanted to be with you, as dust with its ashes.
I often thought that you were the faithful man who clung to the
bridge-post,
That I should never be obliged to ascend to the Looking-for-Husband
Ledge.
When I was sixteen, my Lord went far away.
To the Ch'ü T'ang Chasm and the Whirling Water Rock of the Yü River
Which, during the Fifth Month, must not be collided with;
Where the wailing of the gibbons seems to come from the sky.
Your departing footprints are still before the door where I bade you
good-bye,
In each has sprung up green moss.
The moss is thick, it cannot be swept away.
The leaves are falling, it is early for the Autumn wind to blow.
It is the Eighth Month, the butterflies are yellow,
Two are flying among the plants in the West garden;
Seeing them, my heart is bitter with grief, they wound the heart of
the Unworthy One.
The bloom of my face has faded, sitting with my sorrow.
From early morning until late in the evening, you descend the Three
Serpent River.
Prepare me first with a letter, bringing me the news of when you
will reach home.
I will not go far on the road to meet you,
I will go straight until I reach the Long Wind Sands.
SORROW DURING A CLEAR AUTUMN
BY LI T'AI-PO
I climb the hills of Chiu I--Oh-h-h-h-h! I look at the clear streams
a long way off.
I see distinctly the three branches of the Hsiang River, I hear the
sound of its swift current.
The water flows coldly; it is on its way to the lake.
The horizontal Autumn clouds hide the sky.
I go by the "Bird's Path. " I calculate the distance to my old home.
Oh-h-h-h-h!
I do not know how many thousand _li_ it is from Ching to Wu.
It is the hour of the Western brightness, of the half-round sun.
The dazzle on the island is about to disappear;
The smooth lake is brilliantly white--from the moon?
Over the lake, the moon is rising.
I think of the moment of meeting--the long stretch of time before
it.
I think of misty Yen and gaze at Yüeh.
The lotus-flowers have fallen--Oh-h-h-h-h! The river is the colour
of Autumn.
The wind passes--passes. The night is endless--endless.
I would go to the end of the Dark Sea. How eagerly I desire this!
I think much of fishing for a leviathan from the Island of the Cold
Sea.
There is no rod long enough to raise it.
I yield to the great waves, and my sorrow is increased.
I will return. I will go home. Oh-h-h-h-h!
Even for a little time, one cannot rely upon the World.
I long to pick the immortal herbs on the hill of P'êng.
POIGNANT GRIEF DURING A SUNNY SPRING
BY LI T'AI-PO
The East wind has come again.
I see the jade-green grass and realize that it is Spring.
Everywhere there is an immense confusion of ripples and agitations.
Why does the waving and fluttering of the weeping-willow make me sad?
The sky is so bright it shines; everything is lovely and at peace.
The breath of the sea is green, fresh, sweet-smelling;
The heaths are vari-coloured, blue--green--as a kingfisher feather.
Oh-h-h-h-h--How far one can see!
Clouds whirl, fly, float, and cluster together, each one sharply
defined;
Waves are smoothed into a wide, continuous flowing.
I examine the young moss in the well, how it starts into life.
I see something dim--Oh-h-h-h-h--waving up and down like floss silk.
for four years, when it occurred to him to offer three _fu_ to the
Emperor. The event justified his temerity, and the poet was given a post
as one of the officials in the Chih Hsien library. This post he held for
four years, when he was appointed to a slightly better one at
Fêng-hsien. But, a year later, the An Lu-shan rebellion broke out, which
put a summary end to Tu Fu's position, whereupon he left Fêng-hsien and
went to live with a relative at the Village of White Waters. He was
still living there when the Emperor Ming Huang abdicated in favour of
his son, Su Tsung. If the old Emperor had given him an office, perhaps
the new one would; at any rate it was worth an attempt, for Tu Fu was in
dire poverty. Having no money to hire any kind of conveyance, he started
to walk to his destination, but fell in with brigands who captured him.
He stayed with these brigands for over a year, but finally escaped, and
at length reached Fêng Chiang, where the Emperor was in residence.
His appearance on his arrival was miserable in the extreme. Haggard and
thin, his shoulders sticking out of his coat, his rags literally tied
together, he was indeed a spectacle to inspire pity, and the Emperor at
once appointed him to the post of Censor. But this did not last long. He
had the imprudence to remonstrate with the Emperor anent the sentence of
banishment passed upon the general Tan Kuan. Considering that this
clever and extremely learned soldier had so far relaxed the discipline
of his army during one of the Northern campaigns that, one night, when
his troops were all peacefully sleeping in their chariots, the camp was
surrounded and burnt and his forces utterly routed, the punishment seems
deserved. But Tu Fu thought otherwise, and so unwisely urged his opinion
that the Emperor lost patience and ordered an investigation of Tu Fu's
conduct. His friends, however, rallied to his defence and the
investigation was quashed, but he was deprived of the censorship and
sent to a minor position in Shensi. This he chose to regard as a
punishment, as indeed it was. He proceeded to Shensi, but, on arriving
there, dramatically refused to assume his office; having performed which
act of bravado, he joined his family in Kansu. He found them in the
greatest distress from famine, and although he did his best to keep them
alive by going to the hills and gathering fire-wood to sell, and by
digging up roots and various growing things for them to eat, several of
his children died of starvation.
Another six months of minor officialdom in Hua Chou, and he retired to
Ch'êngtu in Szechwan, where he lived in a grass-roofed house, engaged in
study and the endeavour to make the two ends of nothing meet. At length,
a friend of his arrived in Szechwan as Governor-General, and this friend
appointed him a State Counsellor. But the grass-house was more to his
taste than state councils, and after a year and a half he returned to
it, and the multifarious wanderings which always punctuated his life.
Five years later, when he was fifty-five, he set off on one of his
journeys, but was caught by floods and obliged to take refuge in a
ruined temple at Hu Kuang, where he nearly starved before help could
reach him. After ten days, he was rescued through the efforts of the
local magistrate, but eating again after so long a fast was fatal and he
died within an hour.
Innumerable essays have been written comparing the styles of Li T'ai-po
and Tu Fu. Yüan Chên, a poet of the T'ang period, says that Tu Fu's
poems have perfect balance; that, if he wrote a thousand lines, the last
would have as much vigour as the first and that no one can equal him in
this, his poems make a "perfect circle. " He goes on: "In my opinion, the
great living wave of poetry and song in which Li T'ai-po excelled is
surpassed in Tu Fu's work, he is shoulder higher than Li Po. " Again:
"The poems of Li T'ai-po are like Spring flowers, those of Tu Fu are
like the pine-trees, they are eternal and fear neither snow nor cold. "
Shên Ming-chên says: "Li Po is like the Spring grass, like Autumn waves,
not a person but must love him. Tu Fu is like a great hill, a high peak,
a long river, the broad sea, like fine grass and bright-coloured
flowers, like a pine or an ancient fir, like moving wind and gentle
waves, like heavy hoar-frost, like burning heat--not a quality is
missing. "
Hu Yu-ling uses a metaphor referring to casting dice and says that Li
T'ai-po would owe Tu Fu "an ivory"; and Han Yü, speaking of both Li
T'ai-po and Tu Fu, declares that "the flaming light of their essays
would rise ten thousand feet. "
Poetic as these criticisms are, it is their penetration which is so
astonishing; but I think the most striking comparison made of Tu Fu's
work is that by Tao Kai-yu: "Tu Fu's poems are like pictures, like the
branches of trees reflected in water--the branches of still trees. Like
a large group of houses seen through clouds or mist, they appear and
disappear. "
Sometime ago, in a review of a volume of translations of Chinese poetry
in the London "Times," I came across this remarkable statement: "The
Chinese poet starts talking in the most ordinary language and voices the
most ordinary things, and his poetry seems to happen suddenly out of the
commonplace as if it were some beautiful action happening in the routine
of actual life. "
The critic could have had no knowledge of the Chinese language, as
nothing can be farther from the truth than his observation. It is
largely a fact that the Oriental poet finds his themes in the ordinary
affairs of everyday life, but he describes them in a very special,
carefully chosen, medium. The simplest child's primer is written in a
language never used in speaking, while the most highly educated scholar
would never dream of employing the same phrases in conversation which he
would make use of were he writing an essay, a poem, or a state document.
Each language--the spoken, the poetic, the literary, the
documentary--has its own construction, its own class of characters, and
its own symbolism. A translator must therefore make a special study of
whichever he wishes to render.
Although several great sinologues have written on the subject of Chinese
poetry, none, so far as I am aware, has devoted his exclusive attention
to the poetic style, nor has any translator availed himself of the
assistance, so essential to success, of a poet--that is, one trained in
the art of seizing the poetic values in fine shades of meaning. Without
this power, which amounts to an instinct, no one can hope to reproduce
any poetry in another tongue, and how much truer this is of Chinese
poetry can only be realized by those who have some knowledge of the
language. Such poets, on the other hand, as have been moved to make
beautiful renditions of Chinese originals have been hampered by
inadequate translations. It is impossible to expect that even a scholar
thoroughly versed in the philological aspects of Chinese literature can,
at the same time, be endowed with enough of the poetic _flair_ to
convey, uninjured, the thoughts of one poet to another. A second
personality obtrudes between poet and poet, and the contact, which must
be established between the two minds if any adequate translation is to
result, is broken. How Miss Lowell and I have endeavoured to obviate
this rupture of the poetic current, I shall explain presently. But, to
understand it, another factor in the case must first be understood.
It cannot be too firmly insisted upon that the Chinese character itself
plays a considerable part in Chinese poetic composition. Calligraphy and
poetry are mixed up together in the Chinese mind. How close this
intermingling may be, will appear when we come to speak of the "Written
Pictures," but even without following the interdependence of these arts
to the point where they merge into one, it must not be forgotten that
Chinese is an ideographic, or picture, language. These marvellous
collections of brushstrokes which we call Chinese characters are really
separate pictographic representations of complete thoughts. Complex
characters are not spontaneously composed, but are built up of simple
characters, each having its own peculiar meaning and usage; these, when
used in combination, each play their part in modifying either the sense
or the sound of the complex. Now it must not be thought that these
separate entities make an over-loud noise in the harmony of the whole
character. They are each subdued to the total result, the final meaning,
but they do produce a qualifying effect upon the word itself. Since
Chinese characters are complete ideas, it is convenient to be able to
express the various degrees of these ideas by special characters which
shall have those exact meanings; it is, therefore, clear that to grasp a
poet's full intention in a poem there must be a knowledge of the
analysis of characters.
This might seem bizarre, were it not for a striking proof to the
contrary. It is a fact that many of the Chinese characters have become
greatly altered during the centuries since they were invented. So long
ago as A. D. 200, a scholar named Hsü Shih, realizing that this
alteration was taking place, wrote the dictionary known as "Shuo Wên
Chieh Tzŭ," or "Speech and Writing: Characters Untied," containing about
ten thousand characters in their primitive and final forms. This work is
on the desk of every scholar in the Far East and is studied with the
greatest reverence. Many editions have appeared since it was written,
and by its aid one can trace the genealogy of characters in the most
complete manner. Other volumes of the same kind have followed in its
wake, showing the importance of the subject in Chinese estimation. While
translators are apt to ignore this matter of character genealogy, it is
ever present to the mind of the Chinese poet or scholar who is familiar
with the original forms; indeed, he may be said to find his overtones in
the actual composition of the character he is using.
All words have their connotations, but this is connotation and more; it
is a pictorial representation of something implied, and, lacking which,
an effect would be lost. It may be objected that poems were heard as
well as read, and that, when heard, the composition of the character
must be lost. But I think this is to misunderstand the situation.
Recollect, for a moment, the literary examinations, and consider that
educated men had these characters literally ground into them. Merely to
pronounce a word must be, in such a case, to see it and realize,
half-unconsciously perhaps, its various parts. Even if half-unconscious,
the _nuances_ of meaning conveyed by them must have hung about the
spoken word and given it a distinct flavour which, without them, would
be absent.
Now what is a translator to do? Shall he render the word in the flat,
dictionary sense, or shall he permit himself to add to it what it
conveys to an educated Chinese? Clearly neither the one nor the other in
all cases; but one _or_ the other, which the context must determine. In
description, for instance, where it is evident that the Chinese poet
used every means at his command to achieve a vivid representation, I
believe the original poem is more nearly reproduced by availing one's
self of a minimum of these "split-ups"; where, on the other hand, the
original carefully confines itself to simple and direct expression, the
word as it is, without overtones, must certainly be preferred. The
"split-ups" in these translations are few, but could our readers compare
the original Chinese with Miss Lowell's rendition of it, in these
instances, I think they would feel with me that in no other way could
the translation have been made really "literal," could the poem be
"brought over" in its entirety. If a translation of a poem is not poetry
in its new tongue, the original has been shorn of its chief reason for
being. Something is always lost in a translation, but that something had
better be the trappings than the essence.
I must, however, make it quite clear how seldom these "split-ups" occur
in the principal parts of the book; in the "Written Pictures," where the
poems were not, most of them, classics, we felt justified in making a
fuller use of these analytical suggestions; but I believe I am correct
in saying that no translations from the Chinese that I have read are so
near to the originals as these. Bear in mind, then, that there are not,
I suppose, more than a baker's dozen of these "split-ups" throughout the
book, and the way they were managed can be seen by this literal
translation of a line in "The Terraced Road of the Two-Edged Sword
Mountains. " The Chinese words are on the left, the English words on the
right, the analyses of the characters enclosed in brackets:
_Shang_ Above
_Tsê_ Then
_Sung_ Pines
_Fêng_ Wind
_Hsiao_ Whistling wind (Grass--meaning the sound of
wind through grass, to whistle; and in awe of,
or to venerate. )
_Sê_ Gusts of wind (Wind; and to stand. )
_Sê_ A psaltery (Two strings of jade-stones which
are sonorous. )
_Yü_ Wind in a gale (Wind; and to speak. )
Miss Lowell's rendering of the line was:
"On their heights, the wind whistles awesomely in the pines; it
booms in great, long gusts; it clashes like the strings of a
jade-stone psaltery; it shouts on the clearness of a gale. "
Can any one doubt that this was just the effect that the Chinese poet
wished to achieve, and did achieve by means of the overtones given in
his characters?
Another, simpler, example is in a case where the Chinese poet speaks of
a rising sun. There are many characters which denote sunrise, and each
has some shade of difference from every other. In one, the analysis is
the sunrise light seen from a boat through mist; in another, it is the
sun just above the horizon; still another is made up of a period of time
and a mortar, meaning that it is dawn, when people begin to work. But
the poet chose none of these; instead, he chose a character which
analyzes into the sun at the height of a helmeted man, and so Miss
Lowell speaks of the sun as "head-high," and we have the very picture
the poet wanted us to see.
Miss Lowell has told in the Preface the manner in which we worked. The
papers sent to Miss Lowell were in exactly the form of the above, and
with them I also sent a paraphrase, and notes such as those at the end
of this book. Far from making the slightest attempt at literary form in
these paraphrases, I deliberately made them as bald as possible, and
strove to keep my personality from intruding between Miss Lowell and the
Chinese poet with whose mood she must be in perfect sympathy. Her
remarkable gift for entering into the feeling of the poet she is
translating was first shown in "Six French Poets," but there she
approached her authors at first hand. It was my object to enable her to
approach these Chinese authors as nearly at first hand as I could. That
my method has been justified by the event, the book shows; not merely
are these translations extraordinarily exact, they are poetry, and would
be so though no Chinese poet had conceived them fourteen hundred years
ago. It is as if I had handed her the warp and the woof, the silver
threads and the gold, and from these she has woven a brocade as nearly
alike in pattern to that designed by the Chinese poet as the differences
in the looms permit. I believe that this is the first time that English
translations of Chinese poetry have been made by a student of Chinese
and a poet working together. Our experience of the partnership has
taught us both much; if we are pioneers in such a collaboration, we only
hope that others will follow our lead.
The second section of the book, "Written Pictures," consists of
illustrations, or half illustrations, of an art which the Chinese
consider the most perfect medium in which a man can express himself.
These _Tzŭ Hua_, "Hanging-on-the-Wall Poems," are less known and
understood than any other form of Oriental art. A beautiful thought
perpetuated in beautiful handwriting and hung upon the wall to suggest a
mental picture--that is what it amounts to.
In China, the arts of poetry and calligraphy are united in the
ideographs which form the written language. There are several different
styles in which these ideographs, or characters, may be written. The
earliest are pictograms known as the "ancient pictorial script," they
were superseded in the Eighth Century B. C. by the "great seal"
characters and later by the "lesser seal. " These, which had been
executed with the "knife pen," were practically given up when the
invention of the writing-brush, which is usually translated as "pencil,"
revolutionized calligraphy (_circa_ 215 B. C. ). Their place was taken by
a type of character known as "_li_" or "official script," a simplified
form of the "seal," and this, being an improvement upon all previous
styles, soon became popular. It created almost a new character in which
the pictorial element had largely disappeared, and, with certain
modifications, holds good to-day. The "model hand," the "running hand,"
and the famous "grass hand," so popular with poets and painters, are
merely adaptations of the _li_; all three of these, together with the
_li_ itself, are used in the composition of written pictures.
The written pictures here translated were formerly in the possession of
a Chinese gentleman of keenly æsthetic taste, and are excellent examples
of the art. A photograph of one of the originals will be found opposite
the translation made from it on page 170. The names which follow the
poems are not those of the authors, but of the calligraphists. In the
case of two poems, the authors' names are also given. These written
pictures had no titles, those given here were added simply for
convenience; but the titles to the poems in the body of the book are
those of the poets themselves, except in one or two instances where the
Chinese title conveyed so little to an Occidental mind that its meaning
had to be paraphrased.
The Notes at the end of the book are intended for the general reader.
For which reason, I have purposely excluded the type of note which
consists in cataloguing literary cross-allusions. To know that certain
lines in a poem are quoted from some earlier author, is one of a class
of facts which deeply interest scholars, but are of no importance
whatever to the rest of the world.
A word as to the title of this book: There lived at Ch'êng-tu, the
capital of Szechwan, early in the Ninth Century, a courtesan named Hsieh
T'ao, who was famous for her wit and verse-writing. Hsieh T'ao made a
paper of ten colours, which she dipped in a stream, and on it wrote her
poems. Now, some years before, a woman had taken the stole of a Buddhist
priest to this stream in order to wash it. No sooner had the stole
touched the water than the stream became filled with flowers. In an old
Chinese book, "The Treasury of Pleasant Records," it is told that, later
in life, Hsieh T'ao gave up the "fir-flower tablets" and made paper of a
smaller size. Presumably this fir-flower paper was the paper of ten
colours. The mountain stream which ran near Hsieh T'ao's house is called
the "Hundred Flower Stream. "
I cannot close this Introduction without expressing my gratitude to my
teacher, Mr. Nung Chu. It is his unflagging interest and never-failing
patience that have kept me spurred on to my task. Speaking no word of
English, Mr. Nung must often have found my explanations of what would,
and what would not, be comprehensible to Occidental readers very
difficult to understand, and my only regret is that he cannot read the
book now that it is done.
FIR-FLOWER TABLETS
SONGS OF THE MARCHES
BY LI T'AI-PO
I
It is the Fifth Month,
But still the Heaven-high hills
Shine with snow.
There are no flowers
For the heart of the earth is yet too chilly.
From the centre of the camp
Comes the sound of a flute
Playing "The Snapped Willow. "
No colour mists the trees,
Not yet have their leaves broken.
At dawn, there is the shock and shouting of battle,
Following the drums and the loud metal gongs.
At night, the soldiers sleep, clasping the pommels of their
jade-ornamented saddles.
They sleep lightly,
With their two-edged swords girt below their loins,
So that they may be able in an instant to rush upon the Barbarians
And destroy them.
II
Horses!
Horses!
Swift as the three dogs' wind!
Whips stinging the clear air like the sharp calling of birds,
They ride across the camel-back bridge
Over the river Wei.
They bend the bows,
Curving them away from the moon which shines behind them
Over their own country of Han.
They fasten feathers on their arrows
To destroy the immense arrogance of the foe.
Now the regiments are divided
And scattered like the five-pointed stars,
Sea mist envelops the deserted camp,
The task is accomplished,
And the portrait of Ho P'iao Yao
Hangs magnificently in the Lin Pavilion.
III
When Autumn burns along the hills,
The Barbarian hordes mount their horses
And pour down from the North.
Then, in the country of Han,
The Heavenly soldiers arise
And depart from their homes.
The High General
Divides the tiger tally.
Fight, Soldiers!
Then lie down and rest
On the Dragon sand.
The frontier moon casts the shadows of bows upon the ground,
Swords brush the hoar-frost flowers of the Barbarians' country.
The Jade Pass has not yet been forced,
Our soldiers hold it strongly.
Therefore the young married women
May cease their lamentations.
IV
The Heavenly soldiers are returning
From the sterile plains of the North.
Because the Barbarians desired their horses
To drink of the streams of the South,
Therefore were our spears held level to the charge
In a hundred fights.
In straight battle our soldiers fought
To gain the supreme gratitude
Of the Most High Emperor.
They seized the snow of the Inland Sea
And devoured it in their terrible hunger.
They lay on the sand at the top of the Dragon Mound
And slept.
All this they bore that the Moon Clan
Might be destroyed.
Now indeed have they won the right
To the soft, high bed of Peace.
It is their just portion.
THE BATTLE TO THE SOUTH OF THE CITY
BY LI T'AI-PO
How dim the battle-field, as yellow dusk!
The fighting men are like a swarm of ants.
The air is thick, the sun a red wheel.
Blood dyes the wild chrysanthemums purple.
Vultures hold the flesh of men in their mouths,
They are heavy with food--they cannot rise to fly.
There were men yesterday on the city wall;
There are ghosts to-day below the city wall.
Colours of flags like a net of stars,
Rolling of horse-carried drums--not yet is the killing ended.
From the house of the Unworthy One--a husband, sons,
All within earshot of the rolling horse-drums.
THE PERILS OF THE SHU ROAD
BY LI T'AI-PO
Alas! Alas! The danger! The steepness! O Affliction!
The Shu Road is as perilous and difficult as the way to the Green
Heavens.
No greater undertaking than this has been since Ts'an Ts'ung and Yü
Fu ruled the land.
For forty-eight thousand years no man had passed the boundary of
Ch'in.
Westward, over the Great White Mountain, was a bird-track
By which one could cross to the peak of Omei.
But the earth of the mountain fell and overwhelmed the Heroes so
that they perished.
Afterwards, therefore, they made sky-ladders and joined the cliffs
with hanging pathways.
Above, the soaring tips of the high mountains hold back the six
dragons of the sun;
Below, in the ravines, the flowing waters break into whirlpools and
swirl back against the current.
Yellow geese flying toward the peaks cannot pass over them;
The gibbons climb and climb, despairingly pulling themselves up
higher and higher, but even their endurance fails.
How the road coils and coils through the Green Mud Pass!
With nine turns to a hundred steps, it winds round the ledges of the
mountain crests.
Clutching at Orion, passing the Well Star, I look up and gasp.
I sit long with my hand pressed to my heart and groan.
I ask my Lord how long this Westward wandering will last, when we
shall return.
It is impossible to climb the terrible road along the edges of the
precipices.
Among the ancient trees, one sees only cruel, mournful, black birds.
Male birds, followed by females, fly to and fro through the woods.
Sometimes one hears a nightingale in the melancholy moonlight of the
lonely mountain.
The Shu Road is as perilous and difficult as the way to the Green
Heavens.
The ruddy faces of those who hear the story of it turn pale.
There is not a cubit's space between the mountain tops and the sky.
Dead and uprooted pine-trees hang over sheer cliffs.
Flying waterfalls and rolling torrents outdo one another in clamour
and confusion;
They dash against the perpendicular walls, whirl round ten thousand
rocks, and boom like thunder along the ravines.
This is what the Two-Edged Sword Mountains are like!
Alas! How endless a road for man to undertake! How came he to
attempt it!
The Terraced Road of the Two-Edged Sword twists between glittering
and rocky summits.
One man alone could hold it against a thousand and mow them down
like grass.
If the guardian of the Pass were doubtful whether those who came
were enemies of his kinsmen,
He could fall upon them as a ravening wolf.
At dawn, one flees the fierce tigers;
In the evening, one flees the long snakes
Who sharpen their fangs and suck blood,
Destroying men like hemp.
Even though the delights of the Embroidered City are as reported,
Nothing could equal the joy of going home at once.
The Shu Road is as perilous and difficult as the way to the Green
Heavens.
I turn toward the West, and, gazing long, I sigh.
LOOKING AT THE MOON AFTER RAIN
BY LI T'AI-PO
The heavy clouds are broken and blowing,
And once more I can see the wide common stretching beyond the four
sides of the city.
Open the door. Half of the moon-toad is already up,
The glimmer of it is like smooth hoar-frost spreading over ten
thousand _li_.
The river is a flat, shining chain.
The moon, rising, is a white eye to the hills;
After it has risen, it is the bright heart of the sea.
Because I love it--so--round as a fan,
I hum songs until the dawn.
THE LONELY WIFE
BY LI T'AI-PO
The mist is thick. On the wide river, the water-plants float
smoothly.
No letters come; none go.
There is only the moon, shining through the clouds of a hard,
jade-green sky,
Looking down at us so far divided, so anxiously apart.
All day, going about my affairs, I suffer and grieve, and press the
thought of you closely to my heart.
My eyebrows are locked in sorrow, I cannot separate them.
Nightly, nightly, I keep ready half the quilt,
And wait for the return of that divine dream which is my Lord.
Beneath the quilt of the Fire-Bird, on the bed of the Silver-Crested
Love-Pheasant,
Nightly, nightly, I drowse alone.
The red candles in the silver candlesticks melt, and the wax runs
from them,
As the tears of your so Unworthy One escape and continue constantly
to flow.
A flower face endures but a short season,
Yet still he drifts along the river Hsiao and the river Hsiang.
As I toss on my pillow, I hear the cold, nostalgic sound of the
water-clock:
Shêng! Shêng! it drips, cutting my heart in two.
I rise at dawn. In the Hall of Pictures
They come and tell me that the snow-flowers are falling.
The reed-blind is rolled high, and I gaze at the beautiful,
glittering, primeval snow,
Whitening the distance, confusing the stone steps and the courtyard.
The air is filled with its shining, it blows far out like the smoke
of a furnace.
The grass-blades are cold and white, like jade girdle pendants.
Surely the Immortals in Heaven must be crazy with wine to cause such
disorder,
Seizing the white clouds, crumpling them up, destroying them.
THE PLEASURES WITHIN THE PALACE
BY LI T'AI-PO
From little, little girls, they have lived in the Golden House.
They are lovely, lovely, in the Purple Hall.
They dress their hair with hill flowers,
And rock-bamboos are embroidered on their dresses of open-work silk
gauze.
When they go out from the retired Women's Apartments,
They often follow the Palace chairs.
Their only sorrow, that the songs and wu dances are over,
Changed into the five-coloured clouds and flown away.
THE YOUNG GIRLS OF YÜEH
BY LI T'AI-PO
I
Young girls are gathering lotus-seeds on the pond of Ya.
Seeing a man on the bank, they turn and row away singing.
Laughing, they hide among the lotus-flowers,
And, in a pretence of bashfulness, will not come out.
II
Many of the young girls of Wu are white, dazzlingly white.
They like to amuse themselves by floating in little boats on the
water.
Peeping out of the corners of their eyes, they spurn the Springtime
heart.
Gathering flowers, they ridicule the passer-by.
WRITTEN IN THE CHARACTER OF A BEAUTIFUL WOMAN GRIEVING BEFORE HER MIRROR
BY LI T'AI-PO
I
Bright, bright, the gilded magpie mirror,
Absolutely perfect in front of me on the jade dressing-stand.
Wiped, rubbed, splendid as the Winter moon;
Its light and brilliance, how clear and round!
The rose-red face is older than it was yesterday,
The hair is whiter than it was last year.
The white-lead powder is neglected,
It is useless to look into the mirror. I am utterly miserable.
II
When my Lord went away, he gave me this precious mirror coiled with
dragons
That I might gaze at my golden-threaded dress of silken gauze.
Again and again I take my red sleeve and polish the bright moon.
Because I love to see its splendour lighting up everything.
In its centre is my reflection, and the golden magpie which does not
fly away.
I sit at my dressing-stand, and I am like the green Fire-Bird who,
thinking of its mate, died alone.
My husband is parted from me as an arrow from the bowstring.
I know the day he left; I do not know the year when he will return.
The cruel wind blows--truly the heart of the Unworthy One is cut to
pieces.
My tears, like white jade chop-sticks, fall in a single piece before
the water-chestnut mirror.
SONGS TO THE PEONIES SUNG TO THE AIR: "PEACEFUL BRIGHTNESS"
BY LI T'AI-PO
I
The many-coloured clouds make me think of her upper garments, of her
lower garments;
Flowers make me think of her face.
The Spring wind brushes the blossoms against the balustrade,
In the heavy dew they are bright and tinted diversely.
If it were not on the Heaped Jade Mountain that I saw her,
I must have met her at the Green Jasper Terrace, or encountered her
by accident in the moon.
II
A branch of opulent, beautiful flowers, sweet-scented under frozen
dew.
No love-night like that on the Sorceress Mountain for these; their
bowels ache in vain.
Pray may I ask who, in the Palace of Han, is her equal?
Even the "Flying Swallow" is to be pitied, since she must rely upon
ever new adornments.
III
The renowned flower, and she of a loveliness to overthrow
Kingdoms--both give happiness.
Each receives a smile from the Prince when he looks at them.
The Spring wind alone can understand and explain the boundless
jealousy of the flower,
Leaning over the railing of the balcony at the North side of the
aloe-wood pavilion.
SPRING GRIEF AND RESENTMENT BY LI T'AI-PO
There is a white horse with a gold bridle to the East of the Liao
Sea.
Bed-curtains of open-work silk--embroidered quilt--I sleep with the
Spring wind.
The setting moon drops level to the balcony, it spies upon me. The
candle is burnt out.
A blown flower drifts in through the inner door--it mocks at the
empty bed.
THE CAST-OFF PALACE WOMAN OF CH'IN AND THE DRAGON ROBES
BY LI T'AI-PO
At Wei Yang dwells the Son of Heaven.
The all Unworthy One attends beside
The Dragon-broidered robes.
I ponder his regard, not mine the love
Enjoyed by those within the Purple Palace.
And yet I have attained to brightening
The bed of yellow gold.
If floods should come, I also would not leave.
A bear might come and still I could protect.
My inconsiderable body knows the honour
Of serving Sun and Moon.
I flicker with a little glow of light,
A firefly's. I beg my Lord to pluck
The trifling mustard plant and melon-flower
And not reject them for their hidden roots.
THE POET IS DETAINED IN A NANKING WINE-SHOP ON THE EVE OF STARTING ON A
JOURNEY
BY LI T'AI-PO
The wind blows. The inn is filled with the scent of willow-flowers.
In the wine-shops of Wu, women are pressing the wine. The sight
invites customers to taste.
The young men and boys of Nanking have gathered to see me off;
I wish to start, but I do not, and we drink many, many horn cups to
the bottom.
I beg them to look at the water flowing toward the East,
And when we separate to let their thoughts follow its example and
run constantly in my direction.
FÊNG HUANG T'AI
ASCENDING THE TERRACE OF THE SILVER-CRESTED LOVE-PHEASANTS AT THE CITY
OF THE GOLDEN MOUND
BY LI T'AI-PO
The silver-crested love-pheasants strutted upon the Pheasant
Terrace.
Now the pheasants are gone, the terrace is empty, and the river
flows on its old, original way.
Gone are the blossoms of the Palace of Wu and overgrown the road to
it.
Passed the generations of the Chin, with their robes and
head-dresses; they lie beneath the ancient mounds.
The three hills are half fallen down from Green Heaven.
The White Heron Island cuts the river in two.
Here also, drifting clouds may blind the Sun,
One cannot see Ch'ang An, City of Eternal Peace.
Therefore am I sorrowful.
THE NORTHERN FLIGHT
BY LI T'AI-PO
What hardships are encountered in a Northern flight!
We fly Northward, ascending the T'ai Hang Mountains.
The mountain road winds round a cliff, and it is very steep and
dangerous;
The precipice, sheer as though cut with a knife, rises to the great,
wide blue of the sky.
The horses' feet slip on the slanting ledges;
The carriage-wheels are broken on the high ridges;
The sand, scuffed into dust, floats in a continuous line to Yo Chou.
The smoke of beacon fires connects us with the Country of the North.
The spirit of killing is in the spears, in the cruel two-edged
swords.
The savage wind rips open the upper garments, the lower garments.
The rushing whale squeezes the Yellow River;
The man-eating beasts with long tusks assemble at Lo Yang.
We press forward with no knowledge of when we shall return;
We look back, thinking of our former home;
Grieving and lamenting in the midst of ice and snow;
Groaning aloud, with our bowels rent asunder.
A foot of cloth does not cover the body,
Our skins are cracked as the bark of a dead mulberry.
The deep gullies prevent us from getting water from the mountain
streams,
Far away are the slopes where we might gather grass and twigs for
our fires,
Then, too, the terrible tiger lashes his tail,
And his polished teeth glitter like Autumn frosts.
Grass and trees cannot be eaten.
We famish; we drink the drops of freezing dew.
Alas! So we suffer, travelling Northward.
I stop my four-horse carriage, overcome by misery.
When will our Emperor find a peaceful road?
When, before our glad faces, shall we see the Glory of Heaven?
FIGHTING TO THE SOUTH OF THE CITY
BY LI T'AI-PO
Last year they fought at the source of the Sang Ch'ien,
This year they fight on the road by the Leek-green River.
The soldiers were drenched by the waters of the Aral Sea,
The horses were turned loose to find grass in the midst of the snows
of the Heaven High Hills.
Over ten thousand _li_, they attacked and fought,
The three divisions are crumbled, decayed, utterly worn and old.
The Hsiung Nu use killing and slaughter in the place of the business
of plowing.
From ancient times, only dry, white bones are seen on the yellow
sand-fields.
The House of Ch'in erected and pounded firm the wall to make a
barrier before the dwelling-place of the Barbarians,
The House of Han still preserved the beacon-stands where fires are
lighted.
The lighting of beacon fires on the stands never ceases,
The fighting and attacking are without a time of ending.
In savage attack they die--fighting without arms.
The riderless horses scream with terror, throwing their heads up to
the sky.
Vultures and kites tear the bowels of men with their beaks
And fly to hang them on the branches of dead trees.
Officers and soldiers lying in mud, in grass, in undergrowth.
Helpless, the General--Yes, incapable before this!
We have learnt that soldiers are evil tools,
But wise men have not accomplished the ending of war, and still we
employ them.
THE CROSSWISE RIVER
BY LI T'AI-PO
I
There are people who say the Crosswise River is good;
I say the Crosswise River is terrible.
The savage wind blows as if it would overturn the Heaven's Gate
Mountains.
The white waves are as high as the high rooms in the Temple of Wa
Kuan.
II
The sea tide flowing Southward passes Hsün Yang.
From the beginning of things, the Ox Ledge has been more dangerous
than the Standing Horse Hill.
Those who wish to cross the Crosswise River
Find evil winds and waves.
The misery of that one stretch of water draws out its length to ten
thousand _li_.
III
When the Sea Demon passes by, a vicious wind curves back.
The waves beat open the rock wall of the Gate of Heaven.
Is the Eighth Month tide-bore of Chêkiang equal to this?
It seems as though the vast, booming waves were part of the
mountains--they spurt out snow.
ON HEARING THE BUDDHIST PRIEST OF SHU PLAY HIS TABLE-LUTE
BY LI T'AI-PO
The Priest of the Province of Shu, carrying his table-lute in a
cover of green, shot silk,
Comes down the Western slope of the peak of Mount Omei.
He moves his hands for me, striking the lute.
It is like listening to the waters in ten thousand ravines, and the
wind in ten thousand pine-trees.
The traveller's heart is washed clean as in flowing water.
The echoes of the overtones join with the evening bell.
I am not conscious of the sunset behind the jade-grey hill,
Nor how many and dark are the Autumn clouds.
CH'ANG KAN
BY LI T'AI-PO
When the hair of your Unworthy One first began to cover her
forehead,
She picked flowers and played in front of the door.
Then you, my Lover, came riding a bamboo horse.
We ran round and round the bed, and tossed about the sweetmeats of
green plums.
We both lived in the village of Ch'ang Kan.
We were both very young, and knew neither jealousy nor suspicion.
At fourteen, I became the wife of my Lord.
I could not yet lay aside my face of shame;
I hung my head, facing the dark wall;
You might call me a thousand times, not once would I turn round.
At fifteen, I stopped frowning.
I wanted to be with you, as dust with its ashes.
I often thought that you were the faithful man who clung to the
bridge-post,
That I should never be obliged to ascend to the Looking-for-Husband
Ledge.
When I was sixteen, my Lord went far away.
To the Ch'ü T'ang Chasm and the Whirling Water Rock of the Yü River
Which, during the Fifth Month, must not be collided with;
Where the wailing of the gibbons seems to come from the sky.
Your departing footprints are still before the door where I bade you
good-bye,
In each has sprung up green moss.
The moss is thick, it cannot be swept away.
The leaves are falling, it is early for the Autumn wind to blow.
It is the Eighth Month, the butterflies are yellow,
Two are flying among the plants in the West garden;
Seeing them, my heart is bitter with grief, they wound the heart of
the Unworthy One.
The bloom of my face has faded, sitting with my sorrow.
From early morning until late in the evening, you descend the Three
Serpent River.
Prepare me first with a letter, bringing me the news of when you
will reach home.
I will not go far on the road to meet you,
I will go straight until I reach the Long Wind Sands.
SORROW DURING A CLEAR AUTUMN
BY LI T'AI-PO
I climb the hills of Chiu I--Oh-h-h-h-h! I look at the clear streams
a long way off.
I see distinctly the three branches of the Hsiang River, I hear the
sound of its swift current.
The water flows coldly; it is on its way to the lake.
The horizontal Autumn clouds hide the sky.
I go by the "Bird's Path. " I calculate the distance to my old home.
Oh-h-h-h-h!
I do not know how many thousand _li_ it is from Ching to Wu.
It is the hour of the Western brightness, of the half-round sun.
The dazzle on the island is about to disappear;
The smooth lake is brilliantly white--from the moon?
Over the lake, the moon is rising.
I think of the moment of meeting--the long stretch of time before
it.
I think of misty Yen and gaze at Yüeh.
The lotus-flowers have fallen--Oh-h-h-h-h! The river is the colour
of Autumn.
The wind passes--passes. The night is endless--endless.
I would go to the end of the Dark Sea. How eagerly I desire this!
I think much of fishing for a leviathan from the Island of the Cold
Sea.
There is no rod long enough to raise it.
I yield to the great waves, and my sorrow is increased.
I will return. I will go home. Oh-h-h-h-h!
Even for a little time, one cannot rely upon the World.
I long to pick the immortal herbs on the hill of P'êng.
POIGNANT GRIEF DURING A SUNNY SPRING
BY LI T'AI-PO
The East wind has come again.
I see the jade-green grass and realize that it is Spring.
Everywhere there is an immense confusion of ripples and agitations.
Why does the waving and fluttering of the weeping-willow make me sad?
The sky is so bright it shines; everything is lovely and at peace.
The breath of the sea is green, fresh, sweet-smelling;
The heaths are vari-coloured, blue--green--as a kingfisher feather.
Oh-h-h-h-h--How far one can see!
Clouds whirl, fly, float, and cluster together, each one sharply
defined;
Waves are smoothed into a wide, continuous flowing.
I examine the young moss in the well, how it starts into life.
I see something dim--Oh-h-h-h-h--waving up and down like floss silk.
