How to Read Chinese Poetry A Guided Anthology

210 t He tang Dy na s t y

holds the clump of grass, vipaśyanā (or guan) the sickle that cuts it down.”21 In

Wang Wei’s poem, “man quiet” and “night tranquil” are zhi, and “osmanthus falls”

and “spring mountain empties” are guan. Cessation of mental activity allows the

poet to experience true reality. When the realization of emptiness is attained, out

comes the bright moon of enlightenment.

Li Bai (701–762)—brilliant, insouciant, frequently inebriated, and mostly un-

employed—was a master of both the wujue and qijue forms. His “Quiet Night

Thoughts” exemplifies perfect control of structure to create a suggestive closure:

C 1 0. 8

Quiet Night Thoughts

Before my bed, the bright moonlight

I mistake it for frost on the ground

Raising my head, I stare at the bright moon;

Lowering my head, I think of home

[QSTRJJ, 146–147; QTS 5:165.1709]

靜夜思  (jìng yè sī)

bed front bright moon shine 床前明月光 (chuáng qián míng yuè guāng)

suspect is ground top frost 疑是地上霜 (yí shì dì shàng shuāng)

raise head gaze bright moon 舉頭望明月 (jŭ tóu wàng míng yuè)

lower head think old hometown 低頭思故鄉 (dī tóu sī gù xiāng)

The first couplet presents an arresting image: the poet is awakened by brightness

streaming in the window, and he misinterprets its origin. The moon up above

seems to him to be the reflection of frost down below. The second couplet ties the

images of moon and frost to the poet’s homesickness and thereby makes them

significant. Repeating mingyue (bright moon), line 3 directly refers to line 1. As

line 3 directly refers to line 1, we expect line 4 to refer to line 2. That is, line 4 will

in some manner concern frost on the ground. Frost is not mentioned directly, but

with the poet’s lowering his head, it is implied. This is because the first couplet has

presented a two-part visual scene in which the moon is above and the frost is below.

The second couplet repeats the first half of this pattern in line 3—the poet looks

up to see the moon. In line 4, the poet looks down, and so we assume the rest of

the pattern. The round (full) moon, which in Chinese poetry often carries conno-

tations of unity and family togetherness, has caused the traveler to lower his head

and think of home. Yet his thoughts are permeated by the frost, now transformed

into a symbol of his homesickness and still carrying its connotations of coldness,

harshness, and destructiveness. Thus the poem has very subtly projected us into

the poet’s raw emotional state. The first couplet provides the images and structural

pattern that are the backbone of the second couplet. However, the second couplet

is dominant, as it reinterprets what has come before.