Your grasses up north are as blue as jade,
Our mulberries here curve green-threaded branches;
And at last you think of returning home,
Now when my heart is almost broken...
0 breeze of the spring, since I dare not know you,
Why part the silk curtains by my bed?
Original Poem:
「春思」
李白
燕草如碧丝，秦桑低绿枝。
当君怀归日，是妾断肠时。
春风不相识，何事入罗帏？
Interpretation:
There are many poems by Li Bai describing his wife, and this is one of them. In classical Chinese poetry, the word “spring” refers to both the natural spring and the love between a man and a woman. The word “spring” in the title of this poem contains both meanings.
In the first two lines, the grass in Yan is just as soft and delicate as velvet, while the mulberry leaves in Qin have long been so dense that they have bent the branches of the trees.
Instead of portraying in detail how the young woman in Qin misses her husband in Yan, the poem starts with the spring scenes in Yan and Qin, which are far away from each other, and takes the difference between the spring scenes of the two places as the setting and trigger point for the woman’s nostalgia. The woman who is alone in the Qin region is feeling reminiscent of her husband who is far away from her in the Yan region, and hopes that he will return soon.
Sentences 3 and 4: When you miss your home and look forward to the day of your return, I have long been saddened by the thought of you. From the beginning of the two sentences, continue to write the Yan grass FangBi, husband must miss their own, looking forward to home, and at this time the QinSang has been low, it is the thinking woman than the yellow flowers thin, further rendering the thinking woman’s pain of lovesickness.
Five, six two sentences, the spring wind ah you and I have never known, why blow into the tent to stir up my sadness? When the spring breeze stirs up the tent, the woman’s rebuke of the spring breeze skillfully shows her steadfastness in love.
Although the whole poem is short, the connotation is compounded, not only depicting the thoughts of the thinking woman for her husband, but also showing her faithfulness to her love and chastity. With the help of reimagination, the thought of a woman, the idea of two places, the seemingly irrational words, the wonderful transmission of inexhaustible thoughts.
Poem translator:
Kiang Kanghu
About the poet:
Li Bai (李白), 701 ~ 762 A.D., whose ancestral home was in Gansu, was preceded by Li Guang, a general of the Han Dynasty. Tang poetry is one of the brightest constellations in the history of Chinese literature, and one of the brightest stars is Li Bai.
