The reason why it is called "Tang poetry and Song Ci" is because its respective peaks of ancient poetry, whether it is the expression technique or the artistry, have reached an unprecedented height, and it is difficult for posterity to surpass no matter how hard it is. However, in the Qing Dynasty, there were two famous lyricists, one is the today highly respected Nalan Rongruo, and the other is the late Qing Dynasty Wang Guowei. Speaking of this lyricist, I believe that many people are not strangers, he is not only a master of traditional Chinese studies, but also the words created can be comparable to Song Ci. Wang Guowei, originally known as Guozhen (国桢), was a native of Haining, Zhejiang Province. He was the last important aesthetic and literary thinker in modern China, and a famous scholar with an international reputation, who wrote many excellent works in his lifetime, including the famous "Words and Sayings of the World".
Today, I review Wang Guowei's "Butterfly Love Flower Reading the End of the World parting Pain", the original text is as follows:
Reading the end of the world parting pain,
If you don't come back, there will be no flowers.
The bottom of the flower looks at each other without a word,
Green window spring and sky are perfect.
Wait to put the acacia lamp down to sue,
A wisp of new joy, a thousand strands of old hate.
The most is that the human world cannot be retained,
Zhu Yan Ci Mirror Flower Ci Tree.
The meaning of this song is: perennial wandering, traveling all over the world, experiencing the pain of parting, seeing the warmth and coldness of human feelings. Unexpectedly, it was difficult to return to the old place, and those who had been friends of the past had withered and drifted away like flowers. Looking back on the past, I spent time parting with her, eclipsed, relatively speechless, only away from the sorrow and choked on the chest. Now, although I have returned, the spring under the green window is also as late as the sky, which is no longer the scenery at that time, and she has also been beautiful and twilight, and she is gradually getting old. Originally, I planned to guard the lonely lamp of the fluorescent fireflies in the middle of the night and talk about the lovesickness after the farewell. However, a little bit of the joy of a long-term reunion evoked endless long-term pain of lovesickness. I knew that in this world, all the beautiful things will not last long, and it will be difficult to stay for a long time. What cannot be retained is the face of youth in the mirror that has never returned, and the falling flowers that leave the trees and drift with the wind.
This poem is known as the most moving word that Wang Guowei made for his wife, and it is widely circulated to this day. Wang Guowei married Mo Shi at the age of 22, bid farewell to his wife two years later, wandered around, and traveled from place to place for a long time, and finally returned to his hometown of Haining at the age of 28. The reunion of husband and wife after a long absence was originally a very happy thing. However, he did not expect that his wife had not been seen for many years, and she had become haggard and decaying. Thinking of his originally frail and sick wife, in the days of his absence, alone to support the whole family and pay all his youth, Wang Guowei could not help but be very sentimental, and wrote this "Butterfly Love Flower" for his wife.
On the whole, Wang Guowei's "Butterfly Love Flower" does the opposite, changing the joy of the reunion written by the predecessors, and the pain of the reunion is full of strong tragic colors. He uses flowers as a metaphor for his wife, and by writing about the torment of parting and the situation he sees after returning home, he expresses the complex feelings of shame, regret, love, and pity in his heart, and expresses his sigh of the passing of time. Parting is indeed painful, and in Wang Guowei's eyes, even meeting each other is painful. Life is short, and youth is gone. However, all of their most precious years were spent in separation. Therefore, Wang Guowei couldn't help but let out a sincere and enthusiastic sigh: "The most important thing is that the human world can't stay, Zhu Yan ci mirror flower ci tree." The words reveal the deep love and righteousness for his wife, and it is inevitable to read it with emotion and touching! These two sentences can be called the stroke of God, and one sentence breaks the true meaning of life. People are middle-aged and often prone to nostalgia. Time passed quietly, carefully looking at the vicissitudes of myself in the mirror, I suddenly found that those youthful past events, those strange youthful dreams, and the once youthful countenance have gone with time. The past has passed, whether it is sad or happy, it is just a sigh. Thankfully, we still have tomorrow. Tomorrow's sun is more delicate, tomorrow's flowers are more colorful.
March 4, 2021