How gladly I would seek a mountain
If I had enough means to live as a recluse!
For I turn at last from serving the State
To the Eastern Woods Temple and to you, my master.
...Like ashes of gold in a cinnamon-flame,
My youthful desires have been burnt with the years-
And tonight in the chilling sunset-wind
A cicada, singing, weighs on my heart.
Original Poem:
「秦中感寄远上人」
孟浩然
一丘尝欲卧， 三径苦无资。
北土非吾愿， 东林怀我师。
黄金燃桂尽， 壮志逐年衰。
日夕凉风至， 闻蝉但益悲。
Interpretation:
This is a poem for a monk friend, envying him for his purity and envying himself for his own earthliness. The poem is full of disillusionment, sadness and the pursuit of seclusion, and is a frank lyrical poem.
One of the reasons why Meng Haoran entered Chang’an at the age of forty to seek a career can be found in this poem.
The poet did not have the financial resources to maintain a life of seclusion, the poet’s poor situation, the formation of the ideal and the reality of the contradiction, so the north into Chang’an to seek employment is not what he would like to do, there are economic embarrassment, the poet is very nostalgic for the Eastern Jin Dynasty monks Huiyuan’s life in Mount Lu. Meng Haoran’s poems also mentioned many times that his desire to leave the civil service is because of his family’s poverty. During his stay in Chang’an, prices were high, his money was running out, and his original ambition was diminishing with age because of this encounter. Therefore, when I heard the cicadas singing in the evening, I could not help but feel sadness in my heart. The two lines at the end of the poem further enhance the atmosphere of grief and anger.
Since this poem is written to a person outside the party, it not only remembers Huiyuan, but also refers to remembrance of the person far away, which is aptly and skillfully combined together.
Another characteristic of this poem is its direct expression of feelings. The difficulty of expressing emotions lies in abstraction. Poets often borrow images of concrete things to express their feelings, and often do not use a single word to express their feelings. But this poem is contrary to the usual way of writing. Seek to serve and can not, so that the decline of ambition; exile in Qin, feel the cool wind, heard the cicadas and “more sad”, this writing style as a painting in the white, without embellishment, directly write the heart of the sadness of the sorrow of the sadness, so that people do not feel abstract, but rather feel that the poet’s bright and honest.
Poem translator:
Kiang Kanghu
About the poet:
Meng Haoran (孟浩然), 689-740 AD, a native of Xiangyang, Hubei, was a famous poet of the Sheng Tang Dynasty. With the exception of one trip to the north when he was in his forties, when he was seeking fame in Chang’an and Luoyang, he spent most of his life in seclusion in his hometown of Lumenshan or roaming around.
