Liu Yuxi: Long Tao Sha

The Yellow River is a river of ten thousand miles of sand,

and the waves and winds have been blowing since the end of the world.

Now I'm going straight up to the Milky Way,

to the home of Altair and the Weaving Maiden.

This is the first of a group of nine poems called Wangtao Sha, which was written by Liu Yuxi during the Changqing period of Emperor Mu Zong's reign. This is the first of a group of nine poems*** composed by Liu Yuxi when he was the assassin of Kui Prefecture during the Changqing period of Emperor Mu Zong's reign (821-824). The final couplet of the ninth poem reads, "One suddenly remembers Xiaoxiangzhu, and sings back to welcome the gods in three or two voices." The author may have been inspired by Qu Yuan's exile in Yuan-Xiang Province, where he composed the "Nine Songs" for the people to welcome the gods.

This is a famous poem describing the majestic power of the Yellow River. As the cradle of the Chinese nation and the birthplace of its glorious culture, the Yellow River has been honored by countless poets throughout the ages. Li Bai's "the water of the Yellow River comes from the sky, running to the stream never return", Wang Zhilu's "the Yellow River is far away from the white clouds", these poems, extremely written about the Yellow River's source of far away, the momentum of the fierce, and is still being recited by all. "The water of the Yellow River is coming from the sky", which emphasizes on the grandeur of the Yellow River and expresses the dynamic beauty of its unceasing flow. "The Yellow River is far away from the white clouds", the perspective is opposite to the flow of the river, which is meant to emphasize its long-flowing and leisurely appearance, showing a static beauty. Liu Yuxi's poem on the Yellow River begins with the same description as many other poems on the Yellow River, depicting the great waves of the Yellow River. Immediately following the allusion to Zhang Qian's encounter with the Cowherd and the Weaving Maiden at the source of the poor river, he visualizes "the water of the Yellow River coming from the sky". In addition to Wang Zhilu and Li Taibai, it opens up another realm and adds a layer of wonderful mythological color.

According to Zhang Hua "Museum" records, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty commanded Zhang Qian to poor back to the source of the river, Zhang Qian took a hew to go, through the month to a place, see the city as the government, indoor a woman weaving, and see a husband holding a cow to drink the river. After the return to Shu, only to realize that has been to the Cowherd, the Weaving Maiden two constellations. Here the poet skillfully utilizes the opening and closing relationship between the upper and lower couplets. The first line is from top to bottom, following the trend of the Yellow River; the second line takes "straight up" as a twist, pulling people's attention back from the "flowing to the sea", leading them from the underground to the sky, and from the real world to the world of myths - the Yellow River connects to the Silver Han River, and the hews are taken to the source of the river. The poem's rhythm is both slow and fast. The rhythm of the whole poem is both slow and fast, unrestrained and with an air of dangling.

Wang Taosha

The spring sun is slanting by the Luoshui Bridge,

The blue stream is shallow and the agar sand can be seen.

The wind was blowing in the street for no reason,

and it startled the mandarin ducks out of the waves.

This article is about the spring scene by the Luoshui Bridge. First of all, it shows the warm spring sunshine, and the word "oblique" renders a leisurely atmosphere, which sets the tone for the whole poem. The second line turns to the bridge, the greenish-blue river is flowing leisurely, the fine sand at the bottom of the river can be seen, highlighting the clarity and transparency of the river water, "blue", "Qiong" reflection, clarity and a sense of cleanliness. These two sentences are static scene description, the third and fourth sentences to write a moving scene. "No end" two words, suddenly swung out of a stroke, in the static scene set off waves, the spring weather changes rapidly, the river road suddenly windy, the calm river waves, a pair of mandarin ducks from the water, fluttering the river, the water fluttering like jade splash. This is another kind of realm, which also reveals the vitality of spring. The poem has four lines, the first and third lines are about "bridge" and "strangers", the second and fourth lines are about "blue stream" and "waves". The second and fourth lines are about "blue streams" and "waves". The land and the water, the static scene and the dynamic scene are intertwined and organized in a precise and ingenious way.

Waves

Bianshui flows eastward with tiger's eye lines,

Qinghuai dawn color duck head spring.

Just look at the place where the sand is being poured out from the ferry,

how many people are being ferried to the earth.

Notes

This is a nostalgic poem. The Bianhe River in the title is used by Tang people to refer to the eastern section of Tongji Canal opened by Emperor Yang of Sui, i.e., the section of the canal from Banzhu (north of present-day Xingyang, Henan Province) to the section where Xuyi enters the Huaiyi River. Emperor Yang mobilized more than one million workers to excavate the Tongji Canal to visit Jiangdu, and planted willow trees along the embankment, which was called Sui Causeway. He also built a luxurious palace on the waterfront of Bianshui River. This Bianhe River is the historical witness that Emperor Yang was so extravagant, exhausted the people's wealth, and finally brought about his own destruction. The poet's feelings of hanging on to the past and the vicissitudes of history are triggered by the Bianhe River in front of him.

In the first sentence, the old story of Sui's death is put aside, and the spring color of Bianhe River is written on the front. The blue water of the Bianhe River is flowing eastward, the willow on the embankment is in the shade, the soft silk is curling, the green field on both sides is thousands of miles, the fields are connected, and a piece of boundless spring color is in sight. The flowing water of the Bianhe River, which is going slowly, draws people's attention to the spring colors on both sides of the river in their imagination, which makes the three words of "infinite spring", which are relatively abstract, have a distinctive sense of image, and transitions to the second sentence without any traces. Liu Yuxi's "Yang Liu Zhi" says: "Emperor Yang's palace is on the waterfront of Bianshui River". In the second sentence, "Sui's palace" refers to Emperor Yang's palace by the Bianshui River. The color of spring is always there, but the luxurious palace of Sui Dynasty has been deserted and decayed, leaving only broken wells and walls for people to visit. "has become dust", with hyperbole to emphasize the luxury of the past no longer exist, and the last sentence of the spring color of boundless, eternal, forming a frighteningly strong contrast to see the vicissitudes of the world, the history of merciless. "The city of Taicheng has been a place of luxury for six generations, and it is the most extravagant thing to be in spring. Ten thousand households and thousands of doors into the weeds, only because of a song of the back garden flowers" (Liu Yuxi "Jinling five questions - Taicheng"), contained in the "Sui Palace has become dust" in the meaning, is not this deep historical sentiment?

The first and second sentences are still on the spring color, luxury does not exist in this point of general feeling, three, four further seize the Bianshui spring color typical representative - Sui embankment willow color to write feelings. Willow spring wind, fluttering like snow, this is a good mood Myrtle beautiful spring, but in front of the Bianhe River willow, but the rise and fall of the Sui Dynasty, the vicissitudes of history, full of spring, not only does not make people happy and pleasant, but let a person in vain to increase the feelings. When Emperor Yang along the embankment tree willow, this is for his south tour of Jiangdu extravagant behavior embellished scenery, in the end, the Sui embankment willows became a desultory historical testimony to the death of the country, so that future generations in front of it y feel luxury easy to end, history is merciless. That the wind fluttering, flying poplar, in the eyes of the poet with a deep sense of history, as if it is a symbol of the Sui luxury faded (poplar flowers of Yang Yang and Yang Sui Yang also constitutes a natural connection on the idea, it is easy to let a person produce from the other's associations). However, more people feel pathos, or perhaps such an objective reality: although Sui Jian not far, the mistake in the front, but the contemporary feudal rulers did not learn from the history of the death of Sui profound lessons. Mourning but not learning, can only make the future generations to mourn the present. This is perhaps the deeper meaning of the two lines of the poem, which imply that "pedestrians do not go up the embankment to look at the wind, the Yanghua worry about killing people".

The two poems are similar in the sense that they express historical feelings and convey real political feelings. However, the history of more things Xing feeling, focusing on the meaning of the historical warning; Huai Gu is more touching feelings, focusing on the lyrics of the past and present sense of prosperity and decline. The former is more realistic, the latter is more vague; the former is more concrete, the latter is more ethereal. Li Yi's poem and Li Shangyin's historical poem "Sui Palace", which has similar themes and contents, can be seen in the similarities and differences between the two. Sui Palace" seizes the typical example of "the spring breeze lifts the country to cut the palace brocade, half as a barrier and half as a sail" to see the huge expenses caused by the southern tour of Jiangdu, in order to imply the historical lesson of the extravagance of the country's demise, while "Bianhe Qu" but on the Bianshui spring color, the dike willows and flowers and the Sui Palace of the desolate and decay of the comparison and contrast, in the past and the present prosperity and decline of the historical sentiment. One focuses on the "see the cost of trouble in the corner", and the other focuses on the "rise and fall of the cited ancient". If you do not see their **** the same point, you may see the wistful poetry as a simple hanging and historical sentiment, ignoring the meaning of the present; if you do not see their differences, it is often easy to think that the content of the wistful poems is too vague. This is probably one of the main reasons why the value of the poems is not easily recognized.

The Wave of Sand

The Wave of Sand at the Head of the Parrot Island

The Day will be slanting when the green building is looking at the spring.

The swallows are fighting to return to their homes,

and the madman alone does not remember his home.

The Waves of Sand

The flowers on both sides of the Maundy Thursday River,

The spring winds are blowing the waves and the sand is being poured out.

The girl cut the mandarin duck brocade,

and will set the evening sun toward the middle stream.

The waves of the sand

The sun shines on the foggy river of Chengzhou,

The gold digging woman is accompanied by a river full of kuma.

Beauty jewelry is the seal of the king,

all in the sand from the bottom of the waves.

This poem is the sixth of the nine songs of Wang Taosha. The poet describes the labor of the women panning for gold and celebrates the creativity of labor.

At the beginning of the poem, the reader is sketched a colorful picture of the morning river漉: a round of early sunrise, the morning sunlight gently set aside the morning fog shrouding the surface of the river, the river continent is gradually revealed in a clean and beautiful silhouette. Groups of companion gold panning girl, is scattered full in the bay of the river diligently panning sand percolating gold. At this time, the sun has dispersed the morning mist, that they have been washing for a long time. Poet with the morning light to open the fog of the river this beautiful and picturesque scenery, set off the gold panning female companion labor scene of the magnificence of the performance of their labor heartfelt praise and enthusiastic eulogy.

The last two lines, the author's poetic thinking from the riverside scene to start, from the contrast in the distillation of the far-reaching deep meaning. The first two lines eulogize the labor of the gold women, and then write, of course, can, but will not produce the power of the police. Poet has a special eye, choose to mark the upper class rich and extravagant fame and power jewelry and gold seal to the intention, pointing out that the gold occupied by the rich and powerful, it is the laborers after a lot of hard work from the sand in the bottom of the wave panned from. Revealed the unreasonable social reality: the workers created all the wealth of the world, but it is difficult to get enough to eat; not laborers can be unlimited possession of the fruits of laborers' labor, thus showing the poet y sympathetic to the theme of the working people.

The poem expresses deep and lofty thoughts in the tone of a bright and gentle folk song. The language is simple and simple, refined and precise, very characteristic. The first line of the two verbs, "shine" and "open", accurately and hierarchically write out the passage of time. The word "full" in the second sentence not only shows the large number of people, but also implies that the gold rush has already begun. These common words, extracted from the intuition of life and melted into the poem, are graphic and dynamic. In the third line, two noun phrases are juxtaposed, but it is not too much of a pile-up, rather, it shows that his thoughts are flying and his wording is alert. In the fourth line, the word "all" fully reveals the nature of the society at that time, making the last two lines a good sentence of incisive warning. It is because of this that this metaphorical poem is so intriguing and enlightening.

Wave Amassing Sand

August waves roar from the ground,

The head is a few feet high and touches the mountain back.

In a short time, it entered the sea gate,

and rolled up the sand like a pile of snow.

The waves of sand

Don't say that slander is as deep as the waves,

Don't say that the migrant is as deep as the sand.

Thousands of percolating liquids are hard work,

Blowing out the cold sand is the beginning of gold.

Notes

Wandaosha: the name of the Tang dynasty's opera, also used as the name of the lyric. Liu Yuxi has "Nine Songs of Wave Taosha", and this is the eighth one.

The name is also used to refer to the official who is banished from the country.

Thousand Amoy Ten Thousand Lu漉, Blow through the wild sand began to gold: the metaphor is that although the innocent and upright person was framed by the villain for a while, after all the hard work, his value will still be found. The first is to filter the water.

Ancient Poetry in Modern Translation

Don't say that gossip is as fearful as vicious waves, or that the relegated person is as decadent and indolent as mud and sand forever. The gold has to be filtered a thousand times, and it takes a thousand hardships before the mud and sand are finally removed and the glittering gold is obtained.

This poem means, don't say that gossip is as unfathomable and inescapable as the waves, and don't say that the relegated person is like mud and sand which is forever lost and disheveled. Panning for gold will have to be filtered a thousand times over, through a thousand hardships, as long as the unremitting efforts, will always be panned out of the mud and sand, to get the glittering gold.

"Do not say that the slanderous words such as waves deep, do not say that the migrant like sand sinking." The poet in these two lines of the poem in a firm tone to show that the slanderous words "such as waves deep", "moving guests like sand sinking" phenomenon may not be inevitable. Or, even if the slanderous words are as "deep as the waves", the relocated guests may not be "sinking in the sand". Suffer unjust relegation adversity treatment will not always sink to the bottom of the river as sediment, there are also efforts to strive to fight.

"Thousands of percolate though hard, blowing all the yellow sand to gold." The literal meaning of these two lines of the poem seems to be in the writing of the gold panners have to go through "a thousand percolations", filtering out the sand, and finally get to the gold, writing is the hard work of the gold panners. But in this poem, the poet is in all to show their will, despite the slander, villainous false accusations, so that those innocent and upright loyal soldiers suffered injustice, was dismissed and demoted, expelled from the court, relegated to other places, but they will not sink into the reality of the mud, and will not change their original intention, after hardships and tribulations, ultimately to clear up the wrongdoing, and return to the clean, like panning for gold, despite the "thousands of percolation" to filter out the sand, and finally get to the gold, write is the hard work of gold miners. Like panning for gold, although "a thousand percolating", after all the hard work, but ultimately always "blowing into the wild sand", is the gold sooner or later is to shine.

We link the work with Liu Yuxi's political career, and the slander is obviously the calumny of those who denigrate the Yongzhen party, as well as the rumor that he is full of criticism. In the first two lines of the poem, he has already explicitly revealed his strong will, and then used the concrete event of finding gold in the sand to relate to the fact that a righteous person who has gone through thousands of hardships will eventually endure the ordeal and show his heroic character, which will be recognized by the people of the world. This grandiose belief that good will surely triumph over evil is a true reflection of Liu Yuxi's consistent ideological character. The work summarizes the poet's deep feelings through concrete images, and also gives philosophical inspiration to future generations.

Wave Amoy Sand

The flowing water does not pause,

The first wave is not yet extinguished, and the next wave is born.

It reminds me of Xiaoxiangzhu,

singing back to welcome the gods.