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55. To Zhang the Merit Officer on the Night of the Fifteenth of the Eighth Month | Han Yu

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English translation

Thin clouds roll back on every side, no Milky Way in the sky; a clear wind blows through the void, the moon spreads its waves.

He begins with the sky. Cloud, wind, and moon laid out first — the ground cleared, the man then brought on.

The sand is level, the water still, sound and shadow gone; I raise a cup to you — you should sing.

The sand level, the water still is stillness outside; sound and shadow gone is emptiness felt. Turning to the cup is when a human voice enters the poem.

Your song is sour, your words bitter; before the end I am weeping like rain.

This line is the hinge. What follows is no longer the speaker's scene but Zhang's song.

Dongting joins the sky, Jiuyi rises high; dragons come and go, apes and flying squirrels cry.

The song begins here. It is all the scenery of southern exile, one thing per phrase, no explanation.

Nine deaths to one life, to reach the post; living in hiding, silent, like a fugitive.

Nine deaths to one life is the literal danger of the road. Like a fugitive is a state of mind — a demoted official seeing himself as a man on the run.

Afraid of snakes getting up, afraid of poison eating; the sea air damp and breeding, steaming rancid.

The fears come in threes — snakes, poison, smell. The menace of the far south is daily and small.

The other day they beat the big drum before the prefectural hall; the new emperor succeeds, and men like Kui and Gao Yao are raised.

The song turns to current events. The drum is the signal that a pardon is coming. Kui and Gao Yao are the ancient worthies, named to mean good ministers.

The pardon travels ten thousand li in a day; even those under sentence of death are spared.

Two lines for the speed and reach of the pardon. The bitterness before now meets a turn.

The banished are recalled, the exiled sent home; stains washed off, the court ranks cleansed.

It is all good news, and reads like hope — a foil for the disappointment in the next line.

The prefecture submits his name, the commissioner blocks it; all that is left of his luck is a transfer deeper into the southern wilds.

The turn collapses. The pardon arrives, but it does not reach him. All that is left is where the helplessness shows.

A clerk's post, too low to speak of, where a man cannot escape the rod in the dust.

Under the Tang, petty officials of this rank could be caned for faults. The rod is a concrete humiliation.

Most of my contemporaries are already on the road; the sky road is dark and steep, hard to climb after them.

Already on the road is others' good fortune, hard to climb after his own lagging. The two are set side by side.

Stop your song a while and hear mine; my song today is a different sort from yours.

The close of the poem. All before was Zhang's song; in the last line Han Yu takes it over himself, and leaves it hanging.

Of a whole year, tonight's moon is fullest; a man's lot rests on fate, not on another's will.

Fullest here means best. After so much grievance, the tone suddenly levels.

Wine at hand and I do not drink — what am I to do with this bright moon?

The last line gently sets aside the high talk before it. He says he accepts his fate; in the end he does not.

赏析 · Commentary

一首诗里两个人的歌 · Two Men's Songs in One Poem

这首诗的结构很特别：韩愈先起景，然后说「君当歌」，接着从「君歌声酸」到「天路幽险」全是张功曹的歌辞，最后一句「君歌且休听我歌」才收回来。读的人起初以为是韩愈在写南荒，其实是在替张署代言。一首诗里装了两个人的话，而且第二个人的歌始终没有唱出来。这种安排让全诗成了一场合唱的开头，也是它最耐读的地方。

The structure is unusual: Han Yu sets the scene, says you should sing, and then from your song is sour all the way to the sky road is dark and steep the words belong to Zhang. Only the last line, stop your song a while and hear mine, takes it back. A reader first thinks Han Yu is writing the southern wilds, when in fact he is speaking for Zhang Shu. One poem holds two men's words, and the second man's song is never sung. That arrangement makes the poem the opening of a duet — and its most rewarding feature.

「十生九死到官所」：贬谪写得这么具体 · Nine Deaths to One Life: Exile Written This Concretely

写贬谪，多数人写心情，韩愈写身体。到任所是「十生九死」，住下来是「如藏逃」，日常是「下床畏蛇食畏药」，连空气都「熏腥臊」。一路排下来全是能摸到的东西：蛇、毒、湿气、腥味。这种写法的效果，是把「贬」从一个抽象的词变成每天的处境。等到后面「赦书一日行万里」出现，读者才明白，赦令之所以让人动心，正因为前面这些日子是实实在在过下来的。

Most poets write the mood of exile; Han Yu writes the body. Reaching the post is nine deaths to one life; settling in is like a fugitive; daily life is afraid of snakes getting up, afraid of poison eating; even the air steams rancid. The list runs through things you can touch — snakes, poison, damp, stench. The effect is to turn exile from an abstract word into a daily condition. When the pardon then appears, travelling ten thousand li in a day, the reader understands why it stirs him: those days before it were actually lived through.

末句「与君殊科」留下的空 · The Gap Left by a Different Sort from Yours

全诗最后一句「我歌今与君殊科」，说的是「我的歌和你不一样」，却始终没有把自己的歌唱出来。这个收法把空间留给了诗外：韩愈自己的处境、他对这次赦令落空的判断，都不在字面上。读的人因此要回头去想，为什么他要说「殊科」。一首二十余句的诗，用一句不肯唱来结尾，比唱出来更有分量。

The last line, my song today is a different sort from yours, says that his song differs — and never sings it. The close leaves the space to what is outside the poem: Han Yu's own situation, his judgment on the pardon that passed him by, are not on the page. The reader is sent back to ask why he would say it differs at all. A poem of more than twenty lines ending on a refusal to sing carries more weight than a song would.

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