Since I married the merchant of Ch'ut'ang
He has failed each day to keep his word.
Had I thought how regular the tide is,
I might rather have chosen a riverboy.
Original Poem:
「江南曲」
李益
嫁得瞿塘贾，朝朝误妾期。
早知潮有信，嫁与弄潮儿。
Interpretation:
This is a poem on the subject of boudoir grievances, which is written in the form of a white description of a merchant woman’s heart.
The heroine laments that she is married to a merchant woman and cannot spend time with her husband. It may be that her husband had promised to come home several times, but in the end, he did not return on the wrong date, causing her to wait in vain at the mouth of the river, always returning disappointed. Or the heroine also had a gold hairpin as money to fortune-telling to divine her husband’s return, and then wrote that if I had known, I should have married the tide of men, so that life may be a little more difficult, but you can always rely on. This is both foolish and naive language, as well as bitter and helpless language.
The success of this poem is in its seemingly absurd, unreasonable, but true, frank expression of a young woman alone in the empty room of the grievances, seemingly absurd, unreasonable thoughts, but true, love to the language. The young woman is eagerly looking forward to her son-in-law. This inner activity process, which is born from hope and regret, is in line with the inner world of the businesswoman in the poem.
The poem seems to come out of the mouth, and the language is clean and unadorned, showing the characteristics of the folk songs of Lefu.
Poem translator:
Kiang Kanghu
About the poet:
Li Yi (李益), 748-829 AD, a native of Wuwei in Gansu Province, was one of the “Ten Scholarly Men of the Dali Dynasty”, and is best known for his works on the border and the Plateau, especially for his seven-character stanzas. His poems had a harmonious rhythm and were sung by musicians at that time.
