5. Tune: A Thousand Autumns (Zhang Xian)
Text
English translation
Original Chinese text
数声鶗鴂，又报芳菲歇。惜春更选残红折，雨轻风色暴，梅子青时节。永丰柳，无人尽日飞花雪。
English translation
A few cries of the cuckoo-like tihu bird announce once more that spring’s blossoms are fading. Those reluctant to let spring go pick through the remaining flowers. The rain is light, but the wind turns fierce; green plums mark the season. By the willows of Yongfeng, fluff drifts all day like snow, with no one there to admire it.
Original Chinese text
莫把么弦拨，怨极弦能说。天不老，情难绝，心似双丝网，中有千千结。夜过也，东窗未白凝残月。
English translation
Do not touch the slender string: when resentment runs too deep, the music can speak for it. Heaven does not grow old, and love cannot easily be severed. The heart is like a net woven from paired threads, knotted within by a thousand knots. Night has passed, yet the eastern window is not light; a fading moon still hangs there.
词句注释 · Notes
上片 · First stanza
“鶗鴂”是古诗词中常用来提示春残的鸟声意象。上片把惜春、风雨与梅子初青放在同一时令里；“永丰柳”又借无人赏看的柳絮写出繁华消歇后的冷落。
The call of the tihu bird traditionally signals late spring in poetry. This stanza places reluctance to lose spring beside sudden weather and newly green plums; the unadmired willows of Yongfeng extend the sense of decline after the season’s display.
下片 · Second stanza
下片由弦声引出难以言说的怨情，再用“心似双丝网”把纠结写成具体形状。“千千结”强调情思盘结不解；末句以彻夜未眠的残月收住全词。
Music gives voice to resentment that cannot be spoken. The image of a heart like a net of paired threads turns entanglement into something visible, while “a thousand knots” stresses its persistence. The last line closes on a moon still visible after a sleepless night.