拟咏怀·其七

Meaning

At Elm Pass all word has been cut off, and the envoys of Han no longer pass this way. The nomad reed-pipe plays a tune that brings down tears; the Qiang flute sings a song that breaks the heart. The slender waist has shrunk within its band of white silk, and tears of parting have dimmed the light of the eyes. The heart's bitterness never comes to rest, and of the rosy bloom of youth little now remains. Withered wood still hopes to fill up the sea; the green mountain still looks to cut off the river.

榆关断绝了音信，汉家的使者不再经过。胡笳吹奏落泪的曲调，羌笛唱出断肠的歌。纤细的腰身因消瘦减损了束素，别离的泪水损伤了明眸。怅恨之心终不歇止，红润的容颜再无多少。枯木期望填平大海，青山盼望截断河流。

Appreciation

The poem is led by 'At Elm Pass all word is cut off', which states the fact of his severance from the south, while the nomad reed-pipe and the Qiang flute render the grief of a foreign country through the music of the border, and the sound is bitter. The two middle couplets pass from himself to another, using the shrunken waist and the eyes dimmed with tears of a woman longing for an absent man to convey the depth of longing, while in truth he is grieving over his own detention. The closing couplet, 'Withered wood still hopes to fill the sea; the green mountain still looks to dam the river', uses allusion and figure to say through impossible things how obstinately he thinks of home, and within the desolation there is a heavy, brooding weight.

【白话串讲】 “榆关断音信，汉使绝经过”——庾信被扣北方，和南朝音信断绝。“枯木期填海，青山望断河”——他像精卫一样想填海，像望夫石一样望断河——他多想回家。 【意象与手法】 诗以「榆关断音信」领起，写与江南隔绝之实；「胡笳落泪曲，羌笛断肠歌」以边地乐声写异域之悲，声情凄楚。中二联由己及人，以思妇纤腰减素、别泪损波写相思之深，实是自伤羁旅。末联「枯木期填海，青山望断河」用典设喻，以不可能之事写执着的归思，苍凉之中见沉郁。 【情感与主旨】 庾信（513—581），字子山，南阳新野人。初仕梁，四十二岁出使西魏，值西魏灭梁，被留不返，历仕西魏、北周，官至骠骑大将军。虽位望通显，而乡关之思、羁旅之恨终其身不忘。其《拟咏怀》二十七首拟阮籍，多写亡国之痛与羁留之悲，此第七首当为留北前期所作，借音信断绝、异域悲音写故国沦丧、归乡无望之恨。 【名句点睛】 常考主旨——羁留北地、音书断绝、归乡无望之恨与故国之思；「枯木期填海，青山望断河」的用典与设喻；以男女相思托君臣故国之悲的比兴双关；庾信「乡关之思」的文学史意义。

Allusions

Elm Pass, that is the Elm Frontier, is a general name for the passes of the north. The envoys of Han stand for those of Liang, and the poet grieves that no envoy comes to bring him home. The nomad reed-pipe and the Qiang flute are both frontier instruments and carry the sorrow of Cai Yan's 'Eighteen Songs for the Nomad Reed-Pipe'. The band of white silk comes from Song Yu's 'Rhapsody on the Lecher Master Dengtu', where the waist is like a band of silk, and the level waves are the light of a woman's eyes. In the last line, withered wood filling the sea uses the legend of the bird Jingwei that carried stones to fill the ocean, and the green mountain cutting off the river alludes to the old geographies or to the oath of Kuafu, figuring a homecoming that is hopeless and a heart that will not die.

此诗用典绵密而皆融化无痕，是庾信「以典写情」的典范。「榆关」即榆塞，泛指北边关塞（秦汉时筑长城种榆为塞），此处实指庾信羁留之地的北界，以关塞之名写隔绝之实；「汉使」以汉喻梁，自伤身为梁使而不得归，「汉使绝经过」暗用苏武北海牧羊、汉使求归之典的反面——苏武尚有汉使来迎，自己却连汉使都等不来，悲愤更深。「胡笳」「羌笛」皆边地乐器，用蔡琰《胡笳十八拍》之悲意与「羌笛何须怨杨柳」的征戍传统，以边乐写乡思。「束素」出宋玉《登徒子好色赋》「腰如束素」，「横波」指流转的眼波（傅毅《舞赋》「目流睇而横波」），皆以美人意象写憔悴。「枯木期填海」用《山海经》精卫填海典——精卫衔木石以填东海，喻执着不悔的意志；「青山望断河」暗用《水经注》所载或传说中「青山断河」的意象，又近《列子》愚公移山「帝感其诚，命夸娥氏二子负二山」之想，喻归乡之愿如移山填海般无望而坚执。全诗以史典、神话、辞赋典层层铺设，皆服务于「归乡无望而心不死」的主旨，正是庾信「穷南北之胜」的博学与深情。

Commentary

Du Fu, in his 'Six Quatrains Written in Jest', wrote that Yu Xin's writing grew riper with age and that his soaring brush ranged freely, and elsewhere that his poems and rhapsodies in later years stirred the whole region of the river passes. Ni Fan's annotated edition of 'The Collected Works of Yu Zishan' is exhaustive. Later critics take 'In Imitation of Songs of My Heart' as the concentrated expression of Yu Xin's longing for his native region, grant that he exhausted the strengths of both north and south, and rank him the last great poet of the Six Dynasties.

杜甫《戏为六绝句》评庾信「庾信文章老更成，凌云健笔意纵横」，又于《咏怀古迹》称其「暮年诗赋动江关」，正点出庾信入北之后由绮艳转向苍凉沉郁的转变，此《拟咏怀》即其「暮年诗赋」的代表。清·倪璠《庾子山集注》对此组诗考释极详，谓其「借古人之酒杯，浇自己之块垒」，二十七首皆以梁亡后羁留北地为背景，抒「乡关之思」与「亡国之痛」。历代论者多以《拟咏怀》为庾信「乡关之思」的集中体现：其情感的深沉、用典的绵密、风格的苍凉，皆臻六朝之极致，遂有「穷南北之胜」之誉——庾信集南朝声律之美与北朝质实之气于一身，上承齐梁，下启初唐，是六朝文学的殿军，对唐代诗风的形成有深远影响。此第七首尤以「枯木期填海，青山望断河」的痴绝之想著名，论者谓其「以不可能之事写必然之悲」，正是庾信将绝望与执念熔于一炉的巅峰之笔，也是中国诗歌史上写「故国之思」最沉痛的篇章之一。

Prosody

Line by line

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