Presented to Yuan Zai, A Scholar

In 774, when Yuan Zai entered the dawn court audience one morning, a scholar offered up a poem, which his deputies received. When that person’s bitter longings were read to Zai, Zai told them, “Skip to someplace in the middle that is suitable to read out.” Then he said (to the scholar), “Something like this, people cannot read—please recite it yourself.” When the recitation ended, (the scholar) vanished. Afterward Zai was finally ruined, with himself, his wife, and his children executed.

East of the city, west of the city, my former dwelling place—
Within the city flying flowers, scattered like cotton fluff.
Sea-swallows holding mud in their beaks want to come on down—
Within the house, no one is there, and still they fly away.

Records of Spirit Communications also has this incident of Zai. Its poem is slightly different, reading: “South of the city the road is long, there is no place to stay— / Silvergrass flowers scattered, scattered, just like willow seeds. / Sea-swallows holding mud in their beaks want to make their nests— / An empty house, no one is there, and still they fly away.”

献元载
作者：书生
〈大历九年春，元载早入朝，有书生献诗，令左右收之。其人苦欲载读，载云：“候至中书，当为看。”又言：“若不能读，请自诵。”诵毕，因不见。载后竟破家，身及妻子被诛。〉
城东城西旧居处，
城里飞花乱如絮。
海燕衔泥欲下来，
屋里无人却飞去。
〈《通幽录》亦载此事。诗小异，云：“城南路长无宿处，荻花纷纷如柳絮。海燕衔泥欲作窠，空屋无人却飞去。”〉

Yuan Zai spent the last decade-plus of his life as Emperor Daizong’s powerful and corrupt chancellor, before the emperor finally managed to engineer his arrest and execution in 777, along with his family (except one daughter, a nun, who was made a palace servant). It was anciently believed that swallows migrated over the southern ocean to breed again, thus their sometimes being elegantly called “sea-crossing swallows,” or just “sea-swallows” for short.

Lotta gaps in the story here, including what about the poem is so bitter and unsuitable, what exactly the scholar’s grievance is, and how this incident has anything to do with Yuan Zai’s ruin three whole years later.

—L.