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近现代近现代 · 诗 Poem

七里香

The Fragrance of Seven Li (Qilixiang)

席慕蓉

Xi Murong

名篇Masterpiece 抒情Lyric 青春Youth

溪水急着要流向海洋，浪潮却渴望重回土地。
在绿树白花的篱前，曾那样轻易地挥手道别。

The brook water is in a hurry to flow to the sea,
Yet the waves long to return to the land.
Before the hedge of the green trees and the white flowers,
Once, so easily, I waved and said farewell.

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Meaning

A poem of the same name as Xi Murong's famous collection The Fragrance of Seven Li (1981), writing a farewell of the season of youth. The opening, 'the brook water is in a hurry to flow to the sea, yet the waves long to return to the land,' rises with the two-way rush of nature—the brook hurrying to the sea, the waves longing for the land—the parable of the impermanence and the attachment of the human meetings and partings. 'Before the hedge of the green trees and the white flowers, once, so easily, I waved and said farewell' writes the farewell of the youth: the young do not know the taste of parting, and the wave of the hand is too easy; only when the years have turned does one know that that one wave was the heaviest moment of a life. The poem, in twenty-odd characters, the brook and the waves, the hedge and the farewell, carries the tenderness and the regret of the parting of the youth.

溪水急急地要流向海洋，浪潮却渴望重回土地。在那绿树白花的篱笆前，曾经那样轻易地挥手道别。

Appreciation

This is a short lyric poem (free verse), twenty-odd characters with inexhaustible meaning, its art in four points. First, the rise through the scene: the opening, 'the brook water is in a hurry to flow to the sea, yet the waves long to return to the land,' rises with the two-way rush of nature, the parable of the impermanence and the attachment of the meetings and the partings, the feeling lodged in the thing without a trace, inheriting the Book of Songs' tradition of 'first speaking of another thing to rouse the thing sung' and more condensed in the modern poem. Second, the personification: the 'in a hurry' and the 'long' give the brook and the waves the human feeling, the thing and the self sharing the grief—the brook is the self of that year (hurrying to go far), the waves the self of today (longing to return), the natural thing the mirror of the human feeling. Third, the purity and the contrast of the images: the green trees, the white flowers, the hedge, the green and the white, the pure images of the youth, against the 'so easily' of the farewell, the beauty of the youth set off by the ease of the parting. Fourth, the sudden turn of the close: 'once, so easily, I waved and said farewell,' the 'so easily' the eye of the whole poem—the ease of that time, and the weight known only later, the whole poem's regret gathered in the two words.

【白话串讲】席慕蓉写《七里香》：“溪水急着要流向海洋，浪潮却渴望重回土地”。“在绿树白花的篱前，曾那样轻易地挥手道别”——“而沧桑的二十年后，我们的魂魄却夜夜归来”——她写青春与告别。【意象与手法】以自然意象的对照（溪水/浪潮、出/归）起兴，寓情于景；末句以「轻易」二字点醒全诗，举重若轻。【情感与主旨】写青春离别与往事之悔，是席慕蓉诗歌「温柔中见惆怅」风格的缩影。【名句点睛】「曾那样轻易地挥手道别」以平白语写透人生至痛，成为无数人青春记忆的注脚。

Background

Xi Murong (1943–), born in Sichuan, of ancestral home the Ming'an Banner of the Chakhar League in Inner Mongolia, of the Mongol people, her original name Mulun Xilianbo (Mongolian for 'the great river'), moved with her family in childhood to Hong Kong and Taiwan, graduated from the art department of the Taiwan Normal University, then studied at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of Brussels, known as a painter, essayist, and poet. In 1981 she published the collection The Fragrance of Seven Li, a page-storm, reprinted dozens of times in a short period, creating the miracle of the bestseller of the Taiwanese new poetry, called 'the Xi Murong phenomenon'; later she published Youth Without Regret and Nine Pieces of Time. This poem, of the same name as the collection, writes a farewell of the season of youth: the young do not know the taste of parting, and the wave of the hand is too easy; only when the years have turned does one know that that one wave was the heaviest moment of a life. As a Mongol, the prairie memory in her blood and the homesickness after the move to Taiwan make 'parting' the core motif of her writing—from the mainland to Taiwan, from the prairie to the city, the sense of the parting and the attachment of her life, and the farewell of the youth in the poem is the first grain of that homesickness.

席慕蓉（1943—），生于四川，祖籍内蒙古察哈尔盟明安旗，蒙古族，本名穆伦·席连勃（蒙古语「大江河」），幼年随家迁居香港、台湾，毕业于台湾师范大学美术系，后留学比利时布鲁塞尔皇家艺术学院，以画家、散文家、诗人名世。1981年出版诗集《七里香》，一纸风行，短期内再版数十次，创造了台湾新诗畅销的奇迹，被称为「席慕蓉现象」；后又出版《无怨的青春》《时光九篇》等。此诗为《七里香》诗集中的同名诗作，写青春时节的一次告别：少年不识离别滋味，挥手太轻易，及至岁月流转，方知那一次挥手竟是一生中最重的瞬间。席慕蓉身为蒙古族，血脉中的草原记忆与迁台后的乡愁，使「离别」成为其创作的核心母题——从大陆到台湾，从草原到海岛，她的一生便是不断挥手道别的过程；此诗的怅惘，既有青春的普遍经验，亦有族裔与时代的独特底色。又《七里香》诗集以「七里香」为名，取花香远播之意，喻青春与爱情之美好不可久留；此诗置于集首，正是全书的题眼——以一次挥手道别，写尽青春、离别与乡愁三大主题，其地位犹《春江花月夜》之于张若虚。

Art

The art is in four points: the rise through the scene, the personification, the purity and the contrast of the images, and the sudden turn of the close. The brook and the waves of the opening, the two-way rush of nature, the parable of the meetings and the partings; the 'in a hurry' and the 'long,' the brook the self of that year and the waves the self of today; the green trees and the white flowers, the pure images of the youth, against the ease of the farewell; and the 'so easily' of the close, the eye of the whole poem—the ease of that time and the weight known only later, the whole poem's regret gathered in the two words.

此诗为抒情短诗（自由诗），二十余字而含蕴无穷，艺术特色有四。其一，以景起兴：开篇「溪水急着要流向海洋，浪潮却渴望重回土地」以自然界的双向奔赴起兴，暗喻人间聚散的无常与眷恋，寓情于物、不着痕迹，承《诗经》「先言他物以引起所咏之词」的比兴传统而更见现代诗的凝练。其二，拟人化：「急着」「渴望」赋予溪水、浪潮以人的情感，物我同悲——溪水即当年的我（急着远行），浪潮即今日的我（渴望回归），自然之物成为人生情感的镜像。其三，意象的纯度与对比：绿树、白花、篱笆，三个意象勾勒出青春最明媚的背景，色彩清丽（绿、白）而情调单纯；前两句写自然之「往还」（水去而复来、潮退而复涨），后两句写人事之「一去不返」，以自然的循环反衬人事的不可逆，对比之中，怅惘自生。其四，诗眼在「轻易」：「曾那样轻易地挥手道别」以「轻易」一个副词点醒全诗，举重若轻，把无限追悔压进一个副词，正是「以轻写重」的典范。又此诗为画家所作，构图感极强：前两句是远景的「水景」（溪水、海洋、浪潮、土地），后两句是近景的「定格」（绿树白花、篱前挥手），由远及近、由景及人，如镜头推进，最后停在挥手的一瞬，画面感与抒情性高度统一。

Allusions

'The Fragrance of Seven Li' is the name of the plant of the rue family (Murraya paniculata, also called the nine-li fragrance), white in flower and strong in scent, common in Taiwan, said to spread its fragrance seven li; Xi Murong named the collection and the poem after it, taking its meaning of 'the fragrance spreading far'—the beauty of the youth like the fragrance of the flower, spreading far and at last unkeepable, the name of the poem itself the metaphor. The images of the 'brook water—the sea' and 'the waves—the land' of the opening fit the 'water cycle' of nature (the water enters the sea, evaporates into the clouds, falls as rain to the land); the poet, through the 'return' of nature, writes the human longing for the return, the cycle of the water against the irreversibility of the human parting, the depth of the poem in the contrast.

「七里香」本为芸香科植物（学名Murraya paniculata，又称九里香），花白而香浓，台湾常见，相传其香可传七里，故名；席慕蓉以此命名诗集与诗，取其「香远」之意——青春的美好如花香，芬芳远播而终不可留，诗名即隐喻。开篇「溪水—海洋」「浪潮—土地」的意象，与自然界的「水循环」相合（水入海、蒸发为云、降雨归土），诗人借自然之「还」写人事之「不复还」，深得中国古典诗歌「以乐景写哀」「以自然反衬人事」之法，如「年年岁岁花相似，岁岁年年人不同」的传统，而更凝练。「篱前」的意象承古典田园传统：陶渊明「采菊东篱下」的东篱是隐逸之象征，民间「篱笆墙」是家园之边界，绿树白花的篱前，正是青春时代最安全的背景——安全愈甚，挥手愈轻易，悔恨愈深；篱是「家」与「远方」的分界，越过篱笆即是离别，故「篱前」一词已预先写定告别的场景。全诗以物喻人、以自然喻人事，是「天人感应」式比兴传统的现代延续。又「绿树白花」之色彩对照，正见诗人画家的眼光——绿为底色、白为点缀，明净如印象派画幅；而「挥手道别」的意象，亦承《诗经》「昔我往矣，杨柳依依」的送别传统，以自然之物写离别之情，古今一脉，而更见现代人的含蓄。

Commentary

The bestseller of The Fragrance of Seven Li made Xi Murong one of the most influential women poets of the Chinese-speaking world of the 1980s, her poetry with a huge readership in Taiwan, Hong Kong, the mainland, and the overseas Chinese, called 'the Taiwanese writer with the most readers after Sanmao'; some critics say her poetry is 'too clear and shallow,' yet it is precisely this transparent lyricism of 'the truth in the plain words' that precisely soothes countless young hearts, and its 'gentle melancholy' has become a distinctive voice of the Chinese lyric. 'The Fragrance of Seven Li,' with its farewell of the youth, the brook and the waves, and the ease of the wave of the hand, is the model of that voice.

《七里香》诗集的畅销，使席慕蓉成为1980年代华语世界最具影响力的女诗人之一，其诗在台湾、香港、大陆及海外华人中拥有庞大读者群，被称为「三毛之外拥有最多读者的台湾作家」；论者或谓其诗「过于清浅」，然正是这种「以浅语写真」的透明抒情，精准抚慰了无数青春的心灵，其「温柔的惆怅」成为一代人的情感启蒙——在台湾现代诗晦涩成风的1980年代，席慕蓉以可读性极强的抒情诗，把诗重新还给大众读者，其文化史意义不下于其文学史意义。此诗作为诗集同名作，是其风格的代表：意象清丽、情感节制、余韵悠长；「曾那样轻易地挥手道别」一句，被无数人引为青春与离别的注脚，与「人生若只如初见」一样，成为汉语世界关于离别最著名的句子之一。文学史上，席慕蓉以画家之眼入诗（色彩的敏感）、以蒙古族血脉入诗（乡愁的深沉），拓展了台湾现代诗的抒情向度，其作品至今仍是两岸三地中学与大学课堂的热门篇目。

Prosody

Form Modern free verse (short lyric poem)现代自由诗（抒情短诗）

Rhyme Unrhymed (yang, di, bie do not rhyme); the rhythm comes from the evenness of the parallel lines and the ease of the last line; two lines to a stanza and one scene to a stanza, the nature first and the human affair after; 'the brook water in a hurry / the waves long' with the dynamic words in parallel不押韵（洋/地/别不协韵），以对偶句的整齐与末句的舒缓形成节奏；两句一节、一节一境，前写自然后写人事；「溪水急着／浪潮渴望」以动感词对举，音节轻快，末句「曾那样轻易地挥手道别」渐缓渐沉，如叹息收束。

Tone pattern The parallel of the opening is even and flowing, the 'green trees and the white flowers' is bright, and the 'so easily' of the close falls light yet heavy—the whole from the rush of the nature to the ease of the farewell, the regret carried by the rhythm语调温柔而克制，以陈述句娓娓道来，无呼告无感叹，怅惘全在平淡中；由活泼（急着、渴望）入沉静（曾那样轻易），语势先扬后抑，如潮水涨而复落。

Reading note The rhythm of the poem comes from the parallel lines and the ease of the last line, the rush of the brook and the waves and the ease of the wave of the hand, the regret of the youth.此诗为自由诗，不押韵、不拘格律，其节奏之美全在对偶与语速的调度，是「以内在音乐性代外在格律」的抒情短诗典范。开篇「溪水急着要流向海洋，浪潮却渴望重回土地」两句对偶工整：溪水/浪潮、急着/渴望、流向/重回、海洋/土地，四组词两两相对，音节整饬而轻快，如两股水流相激，正是青春奔涌的节奏；「在绿树白花的篱前」一句渐缓，如镜头徐徐摇过青春的场景；「曾那样轻易地挥手道别」以长句收束，「轻易地」三字轻读而「道别」二字重顿，语速由疾转徐、声调由明转暗，如潮水涨而复落、如叹息缓缓出口——全诗前两句活泼明快（急着、渴望），后两句沉静怅惘（曾、轻易），语势先扬后抑，与「自然往还、人事难回」的意脉同步；席慕蓉以画家的构图感（两句一境的对称）与音乐家的节拍感（先疾后徐的语速）写诗，短短四句而声情并茂，正是其「温柔中见惆怅」风格的声学呈现。

Line by line

溪水急着要流向海洋，浪潮却渴望重回土地。

The brook water is in a hurry to flow to the sea, yet the waves long to return to the land. (The rise through the scene: the two-way rush of nature, the brook hurrying to the sea and the waves longing for the land, the parable of the impermanence and the attachment of the meetings and the partings.)

溪水急急忙忙地要流向大海，而涌上来的浪潮却渴望重新回到土地上，这一去一回，正如人生的远行与归乡。

The stream hurries to the ocean; the wave longs to return to the land.

开篇以自然界的双向奔赴起兴，一笔写尽人生聚散的两种驱力。「溪水急着要流向海洋」写水的归向——百川赴海、一往无前，「急着」二字拟人，写少年时对外面世界的奔赴、对远方的渴望：如溪水般急急奔向大海，正是青春义无反顾的模样；「浪潮却渴望重回土地」写水的回望——潮水涌上海岸，又退归陆地，「渴望」二字拟人，写历尽沧桑者对故土、初心的回眸：走过万水千山，方知归处仍是来时之地。两句对偶工整（溪水/浪潮、流向/重回、海洋/土地），一出一归、一急一渴，正写人生两种相反的力量：远行与归根；而溪水与浪潮本是一体之水，正如少年的「我」与今日的「我」原是同一人——当年急着离开，如今渴望回头，全诗的怅惘由此双线并起；以自然之循环反衬人事之难回，起兴之高妙，在一笔写尽聚散往还。

The stream. The stream hurries to the ocean; the wave longs to return to the land. The hurrying stream and the longing wave are the opening. To have hurried to the ocean would be a hurrying; the stream-hurries-to-the-ocean-the-wave-longs-to-return-to-the-land is the hurrying.

在绿树白花的篱前，曾那样轻易地挥手道别。

Before the hedge of the green trees and the white flowers, once, so easily, I waved and said farewell. (The farewell of the youth: the green trees and the white flowers, the pure images of the youth, and the 'so easily' of the wave of the hand—the ease of that time and the weight known only later.)

在那绿树白花掩映的篱笆前面，曾经那样轻易、那样不经意地挥手道别，如今想来，追悔莫及。

Before the fence of green trees and white flowers, I waved goodbye so lightly then.

此两句是全诗的重心，由起兴转入本事，是回忆的定格镜头。「绿树白花」以色块写青春背景——绿与白的纯净明丽，正是少年不识愁滋味的底色，亦见诗人作为画家的色彩敏感：不写「青春美好」而写绿树白花，青春的色彩本身就是全部；「篱前」点出地点——家的边缘、青春的分界，篱是安全与远方、故乡与他乡的分界线，越过篱笆即是道别；「曾那样轻易地挥手道别」是全诗诗眼：「轻易」二字举重若轻，写当年挥手之随便、之洒脱、之不知轻重——因为不知这一别将山长水远、此去经年，所以才「轻易」；而「曾」字与「那样」叠用，把追悔之情压进一个副词，愈平淡愈沉痛，正是「以轻写重」的极致；全诗以「绿树白花」的明媚衬「挥手道别」的黯然，以自然之往还衬人事之难回，二十余字写出青春离别最深的悔与最轻的痛，余韵绵长。

The wave. Before the fence of green trees and white flowers, I waved goodbye so lightly then. The green-tree white-flower fence and the so-light wave goodbye are the close. To have waved so lightly would be a waving; the before-the-fence-of-green-trees-and-white-flowers-i-waved-goodbye-so-lightly-then is the waving.

Study

Word focus

急着／渴望 In a hurry / long. The two words of the personification: the brook hurrying to the sea and the waves longing for the land, the natural things given the human feeling, the brook the self of that year and the waves the self of today, the thing and the self sharing the grief. 「溪水急着要流向海洋，浪潮却渴望重回土地」之「急着」「渴望」是两个相对的拟人动词，是全诗起兴的支点。「急着」写奔赴之切：溪水归海是自然的必然，诗人以「急着」赋予其人的焦灼，正是少年急于远行、急于长大的心绪——青春时代的离别，往往带着迫不及待的轻快；「渴望」写回望之深：潮水回归陆地本是物理的涨落，诗人以「渴望」赋予其人的眷恋，正是中年回望故土、回望初心的深情——走遍天涯之后，方知归途是最深的渴望。一「急」一「渴」、一「着」一「望」，两个动词相对，把自然现象写成人生隐喻：急者终将变渴，出者终将思归；而「急着」的溪水与「渴望」的浪潮本是一体之水，正如少年与中年的我是同一人——此二字并置，已暗藏全诗「当年轻别、今日追悔」的完整逻辑，拟人而寓理，是起兴句的点睛之笔。

轻易 So easily. The eye of the whole poem: 'once, so easily, I waved and said farewell'—the ease of the wave of the hand of that time, and the weight known only when the years have turned, the whole poem's regret gathered in the two words. 「曾那样轻易地挥手道别」之「轻易」是全诗诗眼，一个副词写尽人生至痛。「轻易」本义为简单、随便、不费力，此处写当年挥手的姿态：随便一挥手，便道了别——因为年少，不知离别之重；因为以为来日方长，所以挥手轻如鸿毛；「轻易」二字之妙，在于以「轻」写「重」：挥手的动作愈轻，追悔的分量愈重，当年愈是「轻易」，今日愈知那一别之重如千钧——副词本身不含情感，而诗人把全部怅惘压进这一个词，正是「举重若轻」的现代诗笔法；「曾」「那样」与「轻易」叠用，三词层层加码，把时间（曾）、程度（那样）、姿态（轻易）一并定格，如慢镜头回放那一次挥手；此词一出，全诗由起兴的明丽陡然转入怅惘的深潭，二十余字的小诗因一词而境界全出，是「以一字传神」的典范。

篱前 Before the hedge. The place of the farewell: before the hedge of the green trees and the white flowers, the pure images of the youth, the setting of the youth's farewell, the beauty and the regret in one. 「在绿树白花的篱前」之「篱前」是青春告别的场景核心，其文化意蕴深长。「篱」为篱笆，是家园的边界——中国乡村以篱笆围合院落，篱内是家、篱外是远方，「篱前」正是家与远方的分界点：站在篱前，一步之内是故乡，一步之外是他乡，告别发生在边界上，尤见其重；「篱」又承古典田园意象：陶渊明「采菊东篱下」的东篱是隐逸与安宁的象征，篱是田园生活的标志，绿树白花的篱前，正是青春时代最安全、最明媚的背景——安全愈甚，挥手愈轻易，悔恨愈深；「前」字更妙，写出空间的临界面：不是「篱内」（仍在家里）也不是「篱外」（已在远方），而是「篱前」——正要跨出的那一刻，时间与空间都定格在告别的一瞬。一词写尽告别的场景、边界与瞬间，正是席慕蓉「以画入诗」的笔力。

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