269. To a Palace Maid | Zhang Hu
Text
English translation
Original Chinese text
禁门宫树月痕过，媚眼惟看宿鹭窠。
English translation
Past the palace gate, moonlight slips across the imperial trees; her lovely eyes watch only the nest where herons rest.
A palace maid is a woman serving in the inner palace. The moonlight slips across the treetops, showing how late it is. She watches only the heron's nest: the bird can sleep, while she lies awake alone in the deep palace, her envy left unspoken.
Original Chinese text
斜拔玉钗灯影畔，剔开红焰救飞蛾。
English translation
Beside the lamp's glow she tilts out her jade hairpin and parts the red flame to save a moth.
To draw it out aslant means to pull the hairpin free with a turn of the body. To part means to push the flame open. The gesture is tiny, yet it reveals her tenderness toward the moth: she too is trapped in the deep palace, and so she cannot bear to watch it burn.
赏析 · Commentary
救飞蛾的人是谁 · Who It Is That Saves the Moth
全诗四句只写一个宫女在深夜的几眼和一只手：看树、看鹭巢、拔钗、拨灯。她没有说一句话，可是“救飞蛾”把她的处境说了出来——被幽闭、被忽视，性命也系于他人喜怒。怜惜飞蛾，其实是怜惜自己。
Four lines show only a palace woman's few glances and one gesture at night: watching the trees, the heron's nest, drawing her hairpin, parting the flame. She says nothing, yet the rescue of the moth states her condition—secluded, overlooked, her life held at another's whim. To pity the moth is to pity herself.
小动作里的大寂寞 · Great Loneliness in a Small Gesture
前两句写她久久望着鹭巢，已经透出长夜难捱；后两句忽然给她一个主动的动作。拨灯救蛾只是一瞬，却把漫长的静夜撑开一道缝。张祜不写“怨”字，只写这一下，读者便知道她整晚都醒着，而且心里还留着一点柔软。
The first two lines show her gazing at the heron's nest, already betraying a long, hard night; the last two give her a single deliberate act. Parting the flame to save the moth lasts an instant, yet it opens a crack in the endless quiet. Zhang Hu writes no word of complaint. That one motion is enough to show that she has been awake all night—and that some tenderness remains in her.