行香子. 丹阳寄述古 Special Memories

行香子. 丹阳寄述古

原作: 苏轼（字子瞻, 号东坡居士; 11世纪北宋）

英译及赏析: 闵晓红(2025)

携手江村，梅雪飘裙。

情何限、处处消魂。

故人不见，旧曲重闻。

向望湖楼，孤山寺，涌金门。

寻常行处，题诗千首。

绣罗衫、与拂红尘。

别来相忆，知是何人。

有湖中月，江边柳，陇头云。

Special Memories

(A letter to Shugu from Danyang)

-to the tune of Xingxiangzi

written by Su Shi (11th AC, social name 'Dongpo')

En. trans. by Julia Min (Apr.2025)

I recall the village along the river’s flow.

Plum petals floated on dress hems like snow.  

Not the same company today but same notes,

singing of the old spots—each melts my soul—

Lake Tower, Goldrush Gate, and Temple Solo.

Some places bear hundreds of ci we composed.

If dusted by the silk sleeve, again they’d glow.

Guess who’d been thinking of me in Hangzhou?

Fellow poets, friends of old, and maybe also —

The crest crown, lake moon, and river willows.

Notes：

1.     Ci: A classical Chinese lyric form written to set musical tunes. Unlike regulated verse (shi), ci has irregular line lengths, mimicking natural speech. Su Shi was a master of the form, here using the tune Xingxiangzi.

2.     The silk sleeve: A famous story lies behind this line. During the Tang dynasty, the poet Li She (李涉) once had his poems stolen by a young admirer who later brushed dust from a wall to reveal the verses, then recited them back to him. By Su Shi's time, "dusting the silk sleeve" had become a literary trope for the tender act of rediscovering old poems — brushing away neglect to let the words breathe again. In this poem, the gesture is imagined.

3.     Lake Tower (望湖楼) – A famous pavilion on the eastern shore of West Lake in Hangzhou, where poets gathered to watch rain and moonlight over the water.

4.     Goldrush Gate (涌金门) – An ancient gate in Hangzhou's city wall, near West Lake. Its name refers to the story of a local official who once washed gold from the river sands — a name that shines with prosperity and legend.

5.     Temple Solo (孤山寺) – The temple on Solitary Hill (Gu Shan), a small island in West Lake. "Solo" captures both the hill's isolation and the poet's loneliness after parting from his friend.

6.     The crest crown, moon lake, and river willows – These three images condense the famous scenery of Hangzhou: the mist-veiled ridges of the surrounding hills (here "crest crown" suggests clouds resting on peaks like a crown), the moon reflected in West Lake, and the willows drooping along the Qiantang River. In traditional Chinese poetry, such landscapes are not mere backgrounds — they become the only faithful witnesses to friendship when human companions have scattered.

7.     Hangzhou – The magnificent lakeside capital of the Southern Song dynasty (later), but in Su Shi's time, a beloved provincial posting where he served as magistrate and made lifelong friends. The city's misty hills, rain-swept pavilions, and endless willow-lined shores became synonymous with youthful fellowship and literary revelry.

For Appreciation:

In the 1070s, the Song dynasty poet Su Shi served as a magistrate in Hangzhou alongside his close friend Chen Shugu. They wandered through river villages together, composing poems on every walk. This poem — written after Su Shi left Hangzhou and sent as a letter from Danyang — is an elegy for that friendship.

The opening is deceptively simple: " I recall the village along the river’s flow." "I recall" unlocks the poem's true architecture: memory as the only bridge between Danyang and Hangzhou, between the poet and his absent friend. The rest of the poem now rests on that single, perfect verb. "Plum petals floated on dress hems like snow" — a single image holds an entire season, an entire companionship. Then the present enters: "Not the same company today, but same notes." The music is familiar, but the friend beside him is gone. The poem now oscillates gently between past and present, memory and loss.

What follows is the emotional core. The old spots are sung back to life, and each one "melts my soul" — not mere sadness but dissolution, the self-softening at the edges under the weight of memory. Then come the three places: Lake Tower, Goldrush Gate, and Temple Solo. "Temple Solo" echoes the poet's loneliness: a lone hill in West Lake, as he stands alone in Danyang. The second stanza moves from memory to inscription. The two friends composed "hundreds of ci" — the very song form of this poem. "If dusted by the silk sleeve, again they'd glow" — the poems remain hidden like gold, waiting for a touch to waken them. That touch belongs to the absent friend, or to memory itself.

Then the quiet question: "Guess who'd been thinking of me in Hangzhou?" leads not to a sad answer but to a warm one: "Fellow poets, friends of old, and maybe also — / The crest crown, lake moon, and river willows." Not just people. The place itself remembers him. The crown-shaped hill. The moon over the lake. The willows along the river. Hangzhou has not forgotten. And in that quiet "maybe also", Su Shi allows himself a small, tender consolation — not happiness, but the knowledge that somewhere, the river still flows, and someone — or something — still thinks of him.

My translation aims to capture the poem's spare music. Short lines, plain diction, and a few delicate surprises allow an 11th-century Chinese lyric to feel newly born in English. The poem becomes what it always was: a letter that arrives centuries late and finds us still listening.

Reference:

1. baike.baidu.com