孟郊诗
Poems of Meng Jiao
Index
戏赠无本
A Play for Rootless
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长安秋声干 木叶相号悲 瘦僧卧冰凌 嘲咏含金痍 |
Chang'an's autumn sounds hollow. The leaves howl their sadness to each other. Emaciated Monk lies on the ice, chanting, Whining, cherishing his golden wound. |
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金痍非战痕 峭病方在兹 诗骨耸东野 诗涛涌退之 |
His golden wound is not a battle scar. His severe pain is found in this -- Your poem's bones arouse Dong Ye. Your poem's waves surge and ebb. |
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有时踉跄行 人惊鹤阿师 可惜李杜死 不见此狂痴 |
Sometimes I stagger around town, Startling people with my crane-like cries. Too bad Li Bai and Du Fu are dead and Can't see this comic madness. |
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燕僧耸听词 袈裟喜新翻 北岳厌利杀 玄功生微言 |
Yan Monk arouses with his poetry. In his kesha, he loves the latest upset. On Mt. Heng, he disdains to kill for profit. His mysterious powers spawn profundity. |
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天高亦可飞 海广亦可源 文章杳无底 劚掘谁能根 |
He can fly into the heavens. He knows the vastness of the seas. His writing has an endless profundity. Who can penetrate its depths? |
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梦灵仿佛到 对我方与论 拾月鲸口边 何人免为吞 |
In divine dreams he seems to come To me and explain and talk of how When plucking the moon from the whale's mouth No one can avoid being engulfed. |
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燕僧摆造化 万有随手奔 补缀杂霞衣 笑傲诸贵门 |
Yan Monk shows his blessings As all things flow from his hands. He mends his coat of many colors and Proudly laughs at all the crimson gates. |
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将明文在身 亦尔道所存 朔雪凝别句 朔风飘征魂 |
Brightness comes from having culture And from keeping to the Way. As heavy snow buries others' words, His marching soul floats on the north wind. |
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再期嵩少游 一访蓬萝村 春草步步绿 春山日日暄 |
It's time again to wander to Mt. Song, To pay a visit to the immortal's village. Spring grasses, bit by bit more green. Spring hills, day by day more warm. |
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遥莺相应吟 晚听恐不繁 相思塞心胸 高逸难攀援 |
Distant warblers are singing to each other. It's late and I fear there's only a few. I miss you and your elegant aspirations, Above vulgarity in spite of this vulgar world. |
-- 孟郊
废话
I believe this to be a later poem from Meng Jiao to his younger friend Han Yu. Meng Jiao is Emaciated Monk. Han Yu is Yan Monk. 燕 can be "swallow" (yan4), as in the bird. But here, because Meng Jiao thinks so often of the Zhou kingdom, I think it must be the Yan (yan1) kingdom of that period.
Han Yu was to become the inspiration of what we might call the Neo-Legalists, who resurrected Qin ideas of government, mixed with Han Yu's ideals, in a fundamentalist way. Kind of like the way Neo-Confucians turned Confucianism into a semi-fascist puritanism. We shouldn't blame Han Yu. But he was influential. Meng Jiao quotes one of Han Yu's more famous sayings here in part with 道所存. The whole quote is more or less, "When you find someone who keeps to the Way, make him your teacher."
Meng Jiao and his young friend were both outsiders who had difficulties in passing the imperial exams. From other poems, it seems the two made it through those years by camping outside town together in the summers and sharing a hovel together in the winter. I suspect there were more than just these two in the group of struggling scholars but can't identify any others.
Dong Ye (东野) is Meng Jiao, Wildman of the East. I have no idea which of the two men is Rootless.