137. An Old Friend Lost Among the Tibetans | Zhang Ji
Text
English translation
Original Chinese text
前年戍月支，城下没全师。
English translation
The year before last you were stationed at Yuezhi; beneath the city walls the whole army was lost.
"Yuezhi" is the same as Yüeh-chih and broadly refers to the northwestern frontier. "The whole army was lost" states the defeat plainly, without evasion.
Original Chinese text
蕃汉断消息，死生长别离。
English translation
News is cut off between the Fan lands and the Han lands; whether we live or die, it has become a long parting.
"Living or dead, a long parting" is the core of this poem: not knowing whether the other is dead or alive means one can neither mourn him as a fallen soldier nor wait for him as missing.
Original Chinese text
无人收废帐，归马识残旗。
English translation
No one gathers the abandoned tents; the returning horse recognizes the torn banner.
These two lines are the concrete appearance of the battlefield after the battle. "The returning horse recognizes the torn banner" is the cruelest touch—the horse knows the banner, but the men are already gone.
Original Chinese text
欲祭疑君在，天涯哭此时。
English translation
I want to make a sacrifice, yet suspect you are still alive; at this moment I weep for you at the edge of the world.
"Wanting to sacrifice, doubting you are alive" is the hardest state of mind in the whole poem to write: a sacrifice presupposes certainty of death, and the poet lacks that premise. The weeping in the last line therefore has nowhere to land.
赏析 · Commentary
一首无法完成的悼亡诗 · A Mourning Poem That Cannot Be Completed
朋友在边地战死——这是诗里给出的判断，但作者并不确知。于是全诗写的不是悲伤，是悬而未决。这种处境在古代边塞战争里很常见：军队覆没，消息断绝，家属连死没死都不知道。张籍把这种状态写足了：不能祭，只能哭；哭的时候还留着一丝可能。这是这首诗比一般悼亡诗重的地方。
The friend died in battle on the frontier — that is the poem's judgement, but the poet does not know it for certain. So the poem is not about grief but about suspension. The situation was common in frontier wars: an army destroyed, news cut, families not knowing whether to mourn. Zhang Ji writes that state to the full: no rite possible, only weeping, and even the weeping holds a possibility open. This is what makes the poem heavier than an ordinary elegy.
「归马识残旗」 · "The Returning Horse Knows the Torn Banner"
这一句是全诗最有力的地方。战场上年号、旗帜、马匹都有归属，人没有了，物还在；而物并不知情，马照旧认得那面旗。这个错位把损失说到位，同时避免了直接抒情。张籍不写白骨、不写血流，只写一匹回来的马站在残旗前，读者自己会想到它的主人是谁。
This is the poem's strongest line. On a battlefield the standards, banners, and horses all have owners; the men are gone and the things remain, and the things do not know — the horse still recognises the flag. The dislocation puts the loss exactly, and does it without direct sentiment. Zhang Ji writes no bones and no blood, only a horse come back standing before a torn banner, and the reader supplies whose horse it was.
末句的「疑」 · "Doubt" in the Last Line
「欲祭疑君在」的「疑」不是怀疑消息的真假，是不肯接受。这个字放在全诗最后，作用是把已经积攒的悲哀又推回到不确定里。前面写了覆没、写了战场、写了无人的营帐，读者已经准备接受死亡；末句忽然说「也许你还活着」，情绪就无处安放。唐诗写生离死别，常在这种不确定处见深。
The "doubt" in "wanting to mourn, doubting you live" is not doubt about the report but a refusal to accept it. Placed at the very end, it pushes the accumulated grief back into uncertainty. The poem has already given the defeat, the battlefield, the abandoned tents, and the reader is ready to accept a death; then doubt arrives and the feeling has nowhere to settle. Tang verse about partings by death often finds its depth precisely here.