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217. Mooring for the Night on the Jiande River | Meng Haoran

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English translation

I move the boat and moor beside a mist-veiled islet; as daylight fades, the traveler's sorrow rises afresh.

The misty islet is a patch of land in the river under evening haze. New does not require a wholly new grief: an old traveler's loneliness returns with dusk and the stopping of the boat.

Across the open plain the sky seems lower than the trees; in the clear river, the moon draws close to the traveler.

Both images are seen from the boat. The broad plain lowers the horizon, while clear water brings the moon's reflection near. One view recedes and the other approaches, with the traveler still between them on the river.

赏析 · Commentary

船停下来，客愁才显出来 · Sorrow Surfaces When the Boat Stops

开头两个动作是“移”和“泊”。白天行船时，人还有路程可赶；船一停，天也暗下来，注意力便回到自己身上。孟浩然只用“客愁新”交代情绪，没有说明愁从何来。后两句继续写眼前景物，让这份愁留在江面、原野和月色之间。

The poem begins with two actions, moving and mooring. While the boat travels by day, there is distance to cover; once it stops and darkness arrives, attention turns inward. Meng Haoran gives the emotion only as the traveler's sorrow rising afresh and does not explain its cause. The final couplet stays with the visible world, leaving that sorrow suspended among river, plain, and moonlight.

低下来的天，靠近的月 · A Lower Sky and a Nearer Moon

“天低树”并不是说天真的低于树，而是平野辽阔，远处树木顶着天际；“月近人”也来自水面倒影。两句都把视觉感受写成空间关系。天空低了，月亮近了，周围似乎都向旅人收拢，可他仍是异乡水上的一个过客。

The sky is not literally below the trees; on a broad plain, distant trees meet and seem to support the horizon. The moon comes near through its reflection on the water. Both lines turn visual impressions into spatial relations. Sky lowers, moon approaches, and the world seems to close around the traveler, though he remains a passing stranger on unfamiliar water.

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