南乡子. 集句 Farewell Toast to the Spring Season
- Julia Min
- Feb 27, 2025
- 2 min read
南乡子. 集句
原作: 苏轼（字子瞻, 号东坡居士; 11世纪北宋）
怅望送春怀，渐老逢春能几回？花落楚城愁远别，伤怀 ；何况清丝急管吹！
吟断望乡台，万里归心独上来。景物登临闲时见，徘徊；一寸相思一寸灰！
A Farewell Toast to the Spring Season
--a poem with borrowed verses (Jiju game)
--to the tune of Nanxiangzi
Chinese original: Su Shi
English version: Julia Min (Feb. 2025)
A farewell toast to the spring season,
An ancient grief on fallen crimson.
A wanderer on the farthest margin,
A heart, taken by sorrow in Chu State,
Quietly drains away, not to mention—
The tune chasing on the flute and Qin!
On the Homeview Stage, all music fades.
The vibes linger, stirring homesick longing.
For an outcast forgotten, not yet pardoned,
The best view finds home in care-free minds.
Yet every inch of this burning expectation
Has now turned into cold ashes of incense.
For appreciation:
This is a recreation of Su Shi's ji ju (集句) poem to the tune of Nanxiangzi. The original was composed during Su Shi’s exile in Huangzhou (c. 1080–1084), a period of profound personal and political depression. Su Shi had been charged with "calumny against the Throne". The longer he stayed, the less hope he felt of being recalled. This poem captures that stillness of despair—the moment when hope begins to turn to ash.
What makes Su Shi's original remarkable is its form. Every line except two is borrowed from Tang Dynasty poets—Du Mu, Du Fu, Xu Hun, and Li Shangyin. This was a sophisticated intellectual game, a performance of memory and wit. But beneath the game was genuine grief. Su Shi was not merely playing; he was weaving his own sorrow into the fabric of Chinese poetic tradition.
When I sit with this poem, I am not "translating" a text. I am listening to a voice—a voice that has not stopped speaking across nine centuries. He is still here. He is still wandering, still waiting, still burning.
My task is not to interpret his lines. My task is to let him speak again—in English, for English ears, in a new form that still carries his spirit.
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