Alone in her beauty -- help

[randall_flagg]

Hi there!

I have a couple of questions about this lovely poem:

絕代有佳人， 幽居在空谷；

自云良家子， 零落依草木。

關中昔喪亂， 兄弟遭殺戮；

官高何足論？ 不得收骨肉。

世情惡衰歇， 萬事隨轉燭。

夫婿輕薄兒， 新人美如玉。

合昏尚知時， 鴛鴦不獨宿；

但見新人笑， 那聞舊人哭？

在山泉水清， 出山泉水濁。

侍婢賣珠迴， 牽蘿補茅屋。

摘花不插髮， 采柏動盈掬。

天寒翠袖薄， 日暮倚修竹。

Who is lovelier than she?

Yet she lives alone in an empty valley.

She tells me she came from a good family

Which is humbled now into the dust.

...When trouble arose in the Kuan district,

Her brothers and close kin were killed.

What use were their high offices,

Not even shielding their own lives? --

The world has but scorn for adversity;

Hope goes out, like the light of a candle.

Her husband, with a vagrant heart,

Seeks a new face like a new piece of jade;

And when morning-glories furl at night

And mandarin-ducks lie side by side,

All he can see is the smile of the new love,

While the old love weeps unheard.

The brook was pure in its mountain source,

But away from the mountain its waters darken.

...Waiting for her maid to come from selling pearls

For straw to cover the roof again,

She picks a few flowers, no longer for her hair,

And lets pine-needles fall through her fingers,

And, forgetting her thin silk sleeve and the cold,

She leans in the sunset by a tall bamboo.

Why is this 合昏尚知時 translated as “and when morning-glories furl at night” ?

Why is天寒翠袖薄“And, forgetting her thin silk sleeve and the cold”?

官高何足論 is that lun2 or lun4 here?

Thanks,

Randall

[sissi]

Why is this 合昏尚知時 translated as “and when morning-glories furl at night” ?

"合昏" is a kind of plant(夜合欢--silk tree) which blooms at daylight while furl at night。It means even the silk tree knows the coming of night.

Why is天寒翠袖薄“And, forgetting her thin silk sleeve and the cold”?

翠袖 means silk sleeve.

官高何足論 is that lun2 or lun4 here?

lun4

I am glad you love this poem.The poem was written by the greatest poet Tu Fu(杜甫).He is my favorite poet.

[xiaoxiajenny]

译文：

有一个美艳的佳人，隐居在僻静的深山。世情本来就是厌薄，万事象随风抖动的蜡烛。没想到夫婿是个轻薄儿，又娶了美颜如玉的新妇。合欢花朝舒昏合有时节，鸳鸯鸟不独宿。只与新人调笑，那管我旧人悲哭！变卖首饰的侍女刚回来，牵拉萝藤修补着破茅屋。她摘来野花也不插头打扮。天气寒冷美人衣衫单薄，夕阳下她倚着长长的青竹。

Great poem btw.

[skylee]

合昏尚知時， 鴛鴦不獨宿 - even hehun, being just flowers, keep their promise to bloom in the morning and furl at night; and even mandarin ducks, being just birds, keep their promise to stay with their partners.

天寒翠袖薄， 日暮倚修竹 - imagine an abandoned woman, forgetting the cold and only wearing very thin clothes (thin green sleeves), waiting, pondering, leaning by long bamboos at sunset, thinking of what she has been through ...

[randall_flagg]

Thanks a bunch!

My confusion stemmed in part from Wenlin's translation of 合婚 héhūn -- v. be united in wedlock. That's why I couldn't figure this out. But your interpretations helped a lot. I DO like the poem very much, too.

Hope you don't mind, but I might be posting similar questions about other poems on here every once in a while. I started learning Chinese peoms two weeks ago and I am going by the motto "a poem a day keeps the shrink away" hehehe! But I have a hard time learning anything I don't fully comprehend. I mean could just learn the characters, but that would be beside the point. Hence the questions. Thanks, forums.

[sissi]

Wenlin's translation of 合婚 héhūn -- v. be united in wedlock

合婚 is not the phrase in the posm which is exactly 合昏。The Chinese ancients called 合欢 as 合昏。

I recommend Shijing(or Three hundred poems,《诗经》，又名《诗三百》)which are the most beautiful poems I think.There is a Chinese saying ---even if you can't write poem you can coin something after you have learned three hundred poems of Tang Dynasty.

Have fun with your study.