220. A Grievance | Li Bai
Text
English translation
Original Chinese text
美人卷珠帘，深坐颦蛾眉。
English translation
A beautiful woman rolls up the beaded blind; seated long within, she knits her slender brows.
Deeply seated may suggest sitting for a long time or sitting far inside her chamber. Moth brows is a conventional description of a woman's arched brows. Her identity is left unstated.
Original Chinese text
但见泪痕湿，不知心恨谁？
English translation
All that can be seen are the wet tracks of tears; no one knows whom she grieves for or resents.
The observer can see the tears but not their cause. Hen can hold grief, regret, and resentment together, so the poem does not justify assigning her sorrow to one specific faithless lover.
赏析 · Commentary
诗把原因留在帘后 · The Cause Remains Behind the Blind
珠帘卷起以后，人物进入视线，但她的内心没有因此变得透明。读者看到蹙眉和泪痕，仍不知道事情的来由。末句明确承认“不知”，这比补出一段爱情故事更重要。诗写的是旁观者能够看见的限度，也是一个人有痛苦却不愿或不能说明的状态。
When the beaded blind is raised, the woman enters view, but her inner life does not become transparent. We see the knitted brows and wet tears and still do not know their cause. The final line openly admits not knowing, which matters more than supplying a romance plot. The poem marks the limit of observation: pain may be visible while its story remains private.
四句没有替她说话 · The Poem Does Not Speak for Her
题目先说“怨情”，正文却没有一句直接诉说。女子不发言，叙述者也不代她解释。这样的留白容易被后人套入宫怨或闺怨的固定故事，但原诗本身只确认两件事：她在流泪，旁人不知道她为何流泪。克制正是这首短诗的力量。
The title names grievance, yet the woman never speaks and the observer does not explain on her behalf. Later readers can easily fit the scene into conventional palace or boudoir narratives, but the poem itself confirms only two facts: she is weeping, and others do not know why. That restraint gives the brief poem its force.