Larry's Pretty Good Poetry Journal

A flying bridge parts the broken mist—
From a west-bank rock, I ask a fishing boat:
“All day, peach blossoms flow upon the waters:
On which side of the clear stream is the cave?”

桃花溪
隐隐飞桥隔野烟，
石矶西畔问渔船；
桃花尽日随流水，
洞在清谿何处边？

The cave being the entrance to Peach-Blossom Land (see #229) that the speaker is supposing the fallen flowers are from. The pose is as artificial as any courtly Japanese poem. The flying bridge seems to be one of those high semicircle-arch ones, but some commentaries understand (via the allusion) this as taking place in a mountain gorge, which would make it a bridge high up the walls.

My instinct is that I’m misconstruing the second line — maybe it’s supposed to be “after after/for” a fisherman, to make the scene from the legend complete? Regardless, the couplet seems rhetorically unbalanced as is.

—L.

... is here.

Most poems have been revised since posting, sometimes significantly (and the troublesome #243 has yet another different interpretation -- one I'm more confident of).

---L.

The rough tent covers a fine banquet;
Raiders toast the triumphant return.
Drunk together, dancing in armor—
Thunderous drums shaking the landscape.

塞下曲 首四
野幕蔽琼筵，
羌戎贺劳旋。
醉和金甲舞，
雷鼓动山川。

The raiders are called Qiang, which today is the Mandarin name for a single non-Han ethnic group in western Sichuan, but in the past this was a catch-all term for several peoples living between the Han and Tibetan spheres of influence—thus my leaving it generic.

—L.

In the dark woods, a gust in the grass—
The general draws his bow at night.
At dawn, they search for his white fletching:
The arrow pierced deep into stone.

塞下曲 首二
林暗草惊风，
将军夜引弓。
平明寻白羽，
没在石棱中。

This is based on an incident in the biography of Li Guang in Records of the Grand Historian, during a nighttime tiger hunt. The gust is not the result of the arrow, but what the general shot at.

---L.

The white dew falls upon the jade staircase—
In the long night, it soaks my fine silk stockings.
I withdraw, lower the crystal curtain—
Exquisite: I gaze upon the autumn moon.

玉阶怨
玉阶生白露，
夜久侵罗袜。
却下水晶帘，
玲珑望秋月。

Female speaker, and I get the vibe of frustration at being trapped in an imperial harem. Untranslatable wordplay: the word for exquisite (玲珑: línglóng) is also onomatopoeia for the clink of jewels.

—L.

O where, dear sir, might your house be?
This one lives in Heng Tang precinct.
Please pause your boat a moment, sir—
Might we be from the same hometown?

长干行 首一
君家何处住，
妾住在横塘。
停船暂借问，
或恐是同乡。

This took me down a couple rabbit holes, one of them because many editions of this collection place this (and the rest of this section in my base text) in a different section, the folk-style songs, and some use a different title, with song instead of ballad. (FWIW, they certainly fit in style with the folk songs. I don’t know enough yet to know whether I should rethink my choice of base texts.)

Another rabbit hole: Changgan is not Chang’an the capital, but a city now within the borders of modern Nanjing—on the banks of the Yangzi, with lots of canals.

The speaker uses a humble I used by women talking with men, and an honorific form for requesting he stop. “Precinct” is a guess, added by way of a gloss.

—L.

Drive off the little oriole,
Don’t let it screech upon the branch.
It startled this one from her dream ...
I can’t depart for far Liaoning.

春怨
打起黄莺儿，
莫教枝上啼。
啼时惊妾梦，
不得到辽西。

Yay there’s a personal pronoun, the humble one used by a woman, especially when talking to a man. A common interpretation is that her husband is stationed in a Liaoning garrison on the northeast frontier, and she’d been dreaming of visiting him.

—L.

I asked the boy beneath the pine,
Who told me, “Master’s gathering herbs.”
I can but stand amid these hills,
Not knowing where in the clouds you are.

寻隐者不遇
松下问童子，
言师采药去。
只在此山中，
云深不知处。

Lost in translation: the clouds are deep and the herbs are medicinal.

—L.

Her home’s three-thousand li away,
She’s served the palace twenty years—
But at the sound of “He Manzi”
Tears fall before his majesty.



何满子
故国三千里，
深宫二十年。
一声何满子，
双泪落君前。

He Manzi was a famous singer who somehow offended Emperor Xuanzong and was put to death. Sentimental songs about her soon circulated, one of which affects this experienced imperial handmaiden or concubine. The incident described supposedly happened during the reign of Emperor Wuzong (814-846).

Lost in translation: it’s specifically two tears. Also, it might be better as “a thousand miles.”

(Rhymes! In the wrong pattern, but at this point I’ll take what I can get.)

---L.

Deserted old summer palace—
The palace flowers are lonely red.
The white-haired palace maidens sit
And idly talk of Emperor Xuanzong.

行宫
寥落古行宫，
宫花寂寞红。
白头宫女在，
闲坐说玄宗。

The title is literally an imperial palace used for short stays away from the capital, which isn’t specifically a summer place, but the shorter title seems to convey the essential meaning. The implication is that Emperor Xuanzong (ruled 713-756) hasn’t stayed there for a long time.

—L.