51. Zhe Gu Tian (Yan Jidao)

「彩袖殷勤捧玉钟，当年拚却醉颜红」两句各占一个动作：「殷勤」属她，捧着玉钟不断劝；「拚却」属他，接了杯，把这两个字说出口。「拚」在这里读 pàn，是甘愿、豁出去的意思，「拚却醉颜红」是说打定主意要喝到脸红，不是被酒推着走。「玉钟」「彩袖」把这场酒写得具体，看的人如在席上。但「当年」二字随后落下，提醒这一切已经隔着年头——上片从第一句起就站在回忆里说，越具体，越衬出今天的缺席。一捧一接，双方都没有想让酒停下来的意思。

The upper stanza opens with two answering gestures: colored sleeves press the jade cup forward, attentive, again and again, while the reply says pan que in as many words. Yin qin, the attentiveness, belongs to her; pan, with its older sense of willing resolve, belongs to him: going in on the drink without holding back, set to drink until the face turns red. Jade cup and colored sleeves keep the scene concrete, a table the reader can stand next to. Then dang nian, that year, drops in and quietly repositions everything: the whole warm scene is being narrated from years away, and the more concrete it is, the plainer the absence it is set against. Neither side, cup in hand, wanted the drinking to stop.

「舞低杨柳楼心月，歌尽桃花扇底风」把两句各交给一个动词：舞交给「低」，歌交给「尽」。楼心的月亮本会自己落下，这里却舞到月亮低下去，把天上的一晚算成楼里人做出来的事；桃花扇片子底下趁歌的那一小股风，也要唱到尽了歌才算完。两个动词都不说「久」与「欢」，一夜的长度全记在这两个字上：楼里的人不觉夜深，只看见月与风被自己一样一样用完。紧接着换头「从别后，忆相逢」：上片把一夜用得这样满，那个「忆」字落下时才有分量。

In the middle couplet each line hands itself to one verb: the dance to di, low; the song to jin, spent. The moon over the heart of the tower keeps its own schedule, but here the dancing goes on until that moon is pressed downward, so a movement in the sky is booked as something people in the room did. The peach-blossom fan, waved with the song, stirs a little air of its own; the song counts as finished only when that wind is sung away. Neither verb speaks of long or joyful outright. The length of the night is filed, entire, under two characters. The turn cong bie hou, yi xiang feng follows at once, and because the upper stanza spent a night this full, the word yi, remembrance, lands with that weight behind it.

换头三句先记账：「几回魂梦与君同」，别后的逢发生在梦里，而且不止一次。结句面对的是真相逢：今晚人到对面，能做的动作只有一个——把银灯只管举起来照。「剩」在这里读作只管、尽。见注[5]。照的是眼前人，「犹恐」怕的仍是梦；照一次不足信，便再多照几次。前人评论把这两句系到杜甫《羌村》的「夜阑更秉烛，相对如梦寐」，也是灯下相看、疑身在梦中。今晚到底真不真，词一直停在没有答案的地方。

The three lines after the break keep accounts first: ji hui hun meng yu jun tong — meetings since the parting happened in dreams, and not once only. The closing couplet then puts a real meeting in front of the speaker tonight. In sheng ba yin gang zhao, sheng here carries the sense “just keep on”: the line means holding the silver lamp up to look at the person across the table. See note [5]. The light falls on the person standing there, while the fear is still that all this is a dream; one shining settles nothing, so the lamp is raised again and again. Earlier commentary ties the couplet to Du Fu's Qiangcun verse, yelan geng bingzhu, xiangdui ru mengmei, a late night of holding the candle close, checking each other's faces in case the meeting is a dream. Whether tonight is real the poem never rules on; it stops at the spot where the answer would have to be given.