With twilight passing her silken window,
She weeps alone in her chamber of gold;
For spring is departing from a desolate garden,
And a drift of pear-petals is closing a door.
Original Poem:
「春怨」
刘方平
纱窗日落渐黄昏，金屋无人见泪痕。
寂寞空庭春欲晚，梨花满地不开门。
Interpretation:
This poem mainly expresses the resentment of the courtesan after she lost her favor, and also expresses the poet’s inner complaint about the society she lives in.
The first line points out the time and writes about the lateness of the hour. The light in the room becomes dimmer and dimmer with the sunset of the screen window and the coming of dusk, creating an atmosphere of loneliness and desolation.
In the second line, the place written is the isolated palace, and the person written is a young girl confined in the palace. “No one in the golden house” shows how the situation is very different between the former favor and today’s abandonment. “Tear marks” refers to the formation of marks from long-term tears, indicating that tears are common, loneliness has made the palace maiden’s heart very miserable. The third sentence is about the season of late spring. In late spring, the flowers withered, the courtyard is empty, the palace girl at this time in the environment is also a bleak, according to the second sentence. The courtesan is in such a bleak and lonely environment, destined to wash her face with tears.
Pear blossoms everywhere but do not want to appreciate. Isolated from the world, the degree of loneliness. The scenery is decaying and the courtesan is emaciated, and no one cares to compare it to the fallen flowers, which implies a sense of resentment.
The poem is written from the inside to the outside, from the dusk inside the house to the falling flowers in late spring outside the house, and from no one in the neighborhood to the empty door of the courtyard. The poet uses symbolism to give the words “sunset”, “dusk”, “late spring”, “pear blossoms” and so on. The words are symbolized by the fate of the courtesan and her desolate state of mind.
Poem translator:
Kiang Kanghu
About the Poet:
Liu Fangping(刘方平), whose date of birth and death is unknown, was a native of Luoyang and lived from Tianbao to Dali. Unrecognized for his talent, he lived in seclusion on the shores of the Yingshui and Ru River, and remained unrepresented throughout his life, as he was known at the time. He was a poet and friend of Huangfu Ran. He was a poet and good at painting landscapes.
