Once Upon A Heyday

Was scribbling something with a brush before I went for my jog. During the jog, was able to come up with what seemed more fitting to be the second line… 桃花爭艷紅

1 東君未到雪橫空 The Lord of East had not arrived and snow flying abound in the skies,
2 獨自梅花爭艷紅 Plum blossoms alone vie for redness.
3 三春楊絮沾滿城 And into the third month of spring, poplar catkins doused the entire city,
4 一首珠淚伴寒宮 But tears from One Bushel of Pearls poem to keep company with the lonely moon.

1 Lord of the East – the Chinese God of the sun.

2 Plum blossoms bloom most spectacular in the harshest of winter. Here “red” can also be interpreted as “popular”

3 Yang means poplar, a reference to Yang Guifei.

4 寒宮 is the name of the palace on the moon where the lunar goddess lives alone with the jade rabbit, the three legged toad and the osmanthus tree. 冷宮 also means cold palace but denotes any place in the palace far away from the sight of the emperor where the disgraced palace lady is imprisoned for the rest of her life. Both places are lonely and cold but for different reason and intention. See note 4 of 天無白雲青於藍 for the allusion to “One Bushel of Pearls”.

Wednesday, March 22, 2023