A Poem Thrown at Martial Duke Pei, An Armored Ghost

[lnhammer]

In 741, the army of Martial Duke Pei had stopped for the night. In front of his tent, the martial duke saw an armored figure, who threw him a single sheet of paper and left. The martial duke took it and saw it was merely a four-couplet poem. Greatly displeased, he immediately dropped the paper (into the fire) to become ashes, knowing full well that it was by a ghost. When he sent out his troops, (the battle) went unfavorably and the martial duke was shot under the breast, and after a little more than a month he succumbed to his injury.

We whipped and whipped lean horses through the jumbled mountain ranges.
The gathered mists reflected sunlight—daytime looked like evening.
We drove the long bridge, through the narrow pass to heavenly Han—
The perilous mountain plankway passed through lofty cloud-touching peaks.
We still recall Huaiyin—your futile “fitting stratagem.”
Again we sigh, us loyal troops, not worthy of being heard.
We rose and fell, expended on front lines, countless lives,
So don’t you boast! —the heroes here are your courageous soldiers.

掷裴武公诗
作者：介胄鬼
〈开元末，裴武公军夜宿。武公帐前，见一介胄者，掷一纸书而去。武公取视，乃四韵诗。大不悦，纸随手落为烬，信知鬼物所制也。出师大不利，武公射中臆下，病月馀薨。〉
屡策羸骖历乱峋，
丛岚映日昼如曛。
长桥驾险浮天汉，
危栈通岐触岫云。
却念淮阴空得计，
又嗟忠武不堪闻。
废兴尽系前生数，
休衒英雄勇冠军。

A ghost poem from CTP ch865, though this ghost writes with a more literary style than I’d expect from a typical conscript. There are no pronouns in the poem, so it’s just as easy to read “I” instead of “we.” The general’s title probably has a traditional/official translation, but I haven’t found it. Translation convention: I always silently convert all regnal era years to Common Era.

Tang ghost poems are the best, y’all. They get thrown at people as a “you suck!” gesture.

(Would this make a good Yuletide fandom? Yes—yes, it would.)

---L.

Comments

[marycrawford]

This is fabulous, and I agree that this would make a good Yuletide fandom - though I'm a bit more likely to use this as inspiration for a Chinese fandom like Guardian or Nirvana in Fire. (The angry ghost poem thrown at the general feels very like something that could happen in NiF, honestly.) Thanks so much for posting your translations with extra notes, I love them.

[lnhammer]

There's another one coming up I'm tempted to request for Yuletide. Or at least lobby hard from the sidelines, as I'm not sure I'm up for participating this year.

Got a point about NiF.

[sartorias]

Totally agree about NIF!!!

[sovay]

Greatly displeased, he immediately dropped the paper (into the fire) to become ashes, knowing full well that it was by a ghost.

I appreciate how since basically forever everyone has known that this sort of thing is exactly the wrong thing to do, except for the nimrod who did it.

(I like the poem a lot.)

[lnhammer]

I know, right?

What I want to know, and this is really trivial, is given he immediately burned the paper, how do we know what it said?

[sartorias]

A second ghost must have been tasked to do another toss . . .

[lnhammer]

That is technically possible.

Honestly, more likely is that the general recited it from memory during his month-plus in the infirmary.

[xmarksthespotwhereistand]

(Came from the Yuletide promo post.)
I guess it's based on who is the narrator. The POV of the month-plus infirmary stay can be an interesting one.
Other ghosts, too.
So many questions.

[lnhammer]

So, SO many questions!

[the_future_modernes]

lol so that was a bad choice. Was he not up on his legends and folklore? I feel sorry for him that he ended up lingering for a month though. What a lot of time for regrets.

[lnhammer]

I suspect he thought the folklore didn't apply to him, just like so many of those pesky rules don't that unimportant people have to obey.