A Hundred and Seventy Chinese Poems Part 11

Boys stand leaning at the door Like G.o.ds fallen out of Heaven.

Their hearts brave the Four Oceans, The wind and dust of a thousand miles.

No one is glad when a girl is born: By _her_ the family sets no store.

When she grows up, she hides in her room Afraid to look a man in the face.

No one cries when she leaves her home-- Sudden as clouds when the rain stops.

She bows her head and composes her face, Her teeth are pressed on her red lips: She bows and kneels countless times.

She must humble herself even to the servants.

_His_ love is distant as the stars in Heaven, Yet the sunflower bends toward the sun.

Their hearts more sundered than water and fire-- A hundred evils are heaped upon her.

Her face will follow the years' changes: Her lord will find new pleasures.

They that were once like substance and shadow Are now as far as Hu from Ch'in.[25]

Yet Hu and Ch'in shall sooner meet Than they whose parting is like Ts'an and Ch'en.[26]

[25] Two lands.

[26] Two stars.

DAY DREAMS

By Tso Ssu (third century A.D.)

When I was young I played with a soft brush And was pa.s.sionately devoted to reading all sorts of books.

In prose I made Chia I my standard: In verse I imitated Ssu-ma Hsiang-ju.

But then the arrows began singing at the frontier.

And a winged summons came flying to the City.

Although arms were not my profession, I had once read Jang-Chu's war-book.

I shouted aloud and my cries rent the air: I felt as though Tung Wu were already annihilated.

The scholar's knife cuts best at its first use And my dreams hurried on to the completion of my plan.

I wanted at a stroke to clear the Yang-tze and Hsiang, And at a glance to quell the Tibetans and Hu.

When my task was done, I should not accept a barony, But refusing with a bow, retire to a cottage in the country.

THE SCHOLAR IN THE NARROW STREET

By Tso Ssu

Flap, flap, the captive bird in the cage Beating its wings against the four corners.

Depressed, depressed the scholar in the narrow street: Clasping a shadow, he dwells in an empty house.

When he goes out, there is nowhere for him to go: Bunches and brambles block up his path.

He composes a memorial, but it is rejected and unread, He is left stranded, like a fish in a dry pond.

Without--he has not a single farthing of salary: Within--there is not a peck of grain in his larder.

His relations upbraid him for his lack of success: His friends and callers daily decrease in number.

Su Ch'in used to go preaching in the North And Li Ssu sent a memorandum to the West.

I once hoped to pluck the fruits of life: But now alas, they are all withered and dry.

Though one drinks at a river, one cannot drink more than a bellyful; Enough is good, but there is no use in satiety.

The bird in a forest can perch but on one bough, And this should be the wise man's pattern.

THE DESECRATION OF THE HAN TOMBS

By Chang Tsai (third century A.D.)

At Pei-mang how they rise to Heaven, Those high mounds, four or five in the fields!

What men lie buried under these tombs?

All of them were Lords of the Han world.

"Kung" and "Wen"[27] gaze across at each other: The Yuan mound is all grown over with weeds.

When the dynasty was falling, tumult and disorder arose, Thieves and robbers roamed like wild beasts.

Of earth[28] they have carried away more than one handful, They have gone into vaults and opened the secret doors.

Jewelled scabbards lie twisted and defaced: The stones that were set in them, thieves have carried away, The ancestral temples are hummocks in the ground: The walls that went round them are all levelled flat.

Over everything the tangled thorns are growing: A herd-boy pushes through them up the path.

Down in the thorns rabbits have made their burrows: The weeds and thistles will never be cleared away.

Over the tombs the ploughshare will be driven And peasants will have their fields and orchards there.

They that were once lords of a thousand hosts Are now become the dust of the hills and ridges.

I think of what Yun-men[29] said And am sorely grieved at the thought of "then" and "now."

[27] Names of two tombs.

[28] In the early days of the dynasty a man stole a handful of earth from the imperial tombs, and was executed by the police. The emperor was furious at the lightness of the punishment.

[29] Yun-men said to Meng Ch'ang-chun (died 279 B.C.), "Does it not grieve you to think that after a hundred years this terrace will be cast down and this pond cleared away?" Meng Ch'ang-chun wept.

BEARER'S SONG

By Miu Hsi (died A.D. 245). _Cf._ the "Han Burial Songs," p. 38.

When I was alive, I wandered in the streets of the Capital: Now that I am dead, I am left to lie in the fields.

In the morning I drove out from the High Hall: In the evening I lodged beneath the Yellow Springs.[30]

When the white sun had sunk in the Western Chasm I hung up my chariot and rested my four horses.

Now, even the mighty Maker of All Could not bring the life back to my limbs.

Shape and substance day by day will vanish: Hair and teeth will gradually fall away.

Forever from of old men have been so: And none born can escape this thing.

[30] Hades.

THE VALLEY WIND

By Lu Yun (fourth century A.D.)

Living in retirement beyond the World, Silently enjoying isolation, I pull the rope of my door tighter And stuff my window with roots and ferns.

My spirit is tuned to the Spring-season: At the fall of the year there is autumn in my heart.

Thus imitating cosmic changes My cottage becomes a Universe.

CHAPTER III