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宋 Song · 词 Ci lyric

齐天乐·蝉

Joy of All Heaven: The Cicada

王沂孙

Wang Yisun

咏物Poem on Objects 亡国The Fall of the State 婉约Subtle and Refined

一襟余恨宫魂断，年年翠阴庭树。
乍咽凉柯，还移暗叶，重把离愁深诉。
西窗过雨。
怪瑶佩流空，玉筝调柱。
镜暗妆残，为谁娇鬓尚如许。
铜仙铅泪似洗，叹携盘去远，难贮零露。
病翼惊秋，枯形阅世，消得斜阳几度。
余音更苦。
甚独抱清商，顿成凄楚。
谩想薰风，柳丝千万缕。

A lapful of lingering hate, the palace soul is broken;
Year after year in the green shade of the courtyard tree.
Now it chokes on the cool branch,
Now moves to the dark leaf,
And pours out its parting grief anew.
Rain passes by the western window.
Strange—the jade pendants stream through the air,
The jade zheng tunes its strings.
The mirror is dim, the makeup faded—
For whom does the lovely temple-hair stay so fair?

The Bronze Immortal's leaden tears wash down like rain,
Alas, the plate is carried far away,
And can no longer hold the dew.
The sick wing startles at the autumn,
The withered form reads the ages—
How many sunsets can it endure?
The lingering note is the bitterer.
Why alone hugging the clear shang tone,
It turns at once to desolate grief?
In vain I think of the warm wind,
The thousand threads of the willow.

Listen

Meaning

Wang Yisun, a Southern Song loyalist after the fall of the dynasty, writes the autumn cicada and through it the fall of his state. The cicada is the 'palace soul'—in the ancient tale, the Qi queen who died of resentment turned into a cicada crying on the courtyard tree; and so the cicada's cry is the soul of a fallen dynasty. 'The Bronze Immortal's leaden tears' recalls the Han bronze figure weeping when its dew-collecting plate was carried away—the emblem of a fallen state whose ritual vessels are taken. The sick wing startling at autumn, the withered form reading the ages, are the loyalists themselves, surviving the fall; and the lingering bitter note is the cry of the remnant people. Not a single word names the Song, yet every word is the Song.

一腔余恨如齐后魂断，年年悲啼于庭树翠阴。忽咽凉枝，又移暗叶，重诉离愁。西窗过雨，怪其声如瑶佩流空、玉筝调柱。镜暗妆残，还为谁梳娇鬓？铜仙铅泪如洗，叹承露盘已远去，难贮零露。病翼惊秋，枯形阅世，还能经几度斜阳？余音更苦。为何独抱清商，顿成凄楚？空想薰风，柳丝千万缕。

Appreciation

The art lies in the 'overlay of object and self'—the cicada's life and the loyalist's life made completely one, the cicada the man and the man the cicada. The opening, 'a lapful of lingering hate, the palace soul is broken,' fixes the cicada as the 'palace soul' from the first line; from then on it is no insect but the ghost of a fallen dynasty. The first half writes the cicada's voice and bearing: 'now it chokes on the cool branch, now moves to the dark leaf, and pours out its parting grief anew'—three verbs, choke, move, pour, make the cicada a woman grieving in a low voice; 'the jade pendants stream through the air, the jade zheng tunes its strings' writes the beauty of its cry through the sound of pendants and zheng; 'the mirror is dim, the makeup faded—for whom does the lovely temple-hair stay so fair?' writes the cicada's 'temple-hair' and the loyalist's faded life through a woman looking in her mirror. The second half turns to the cicada's dying and the state's fall: 'the Bronze Immortal's leaden tears' brings in the allusion of the fallen state.

【白话串讲】 “一襟余恨宫魂断，年年翠阴庭树”——王沂孙写蝉：相传宫女魂化蝉。“乍咽凉柯，还移暗叶，重把离愁深诉”——“铜仙铅泪似洗，叹携盘去远，难贮零露”——“病翼惊秋，枯形阅世”——他借蝉写亡国之痛。南宋咏物词的绝唱。【意象与手法】借“齐后化蝉”典故把个体冤恨升格为故国集体哀魂；“乍咽凉柯，还移暗叶”写蝉之幽咽；“铜仙铅泪似洗，叹携盘去远，难贮零露”以金铜仙人铅泪暗写易代之痛；“病翼惊秋，枯形阅世”满纸枯寂。寄托愈隐而痛愈深。【情感与主旨】南宋遗民咏物词绝唱，借秋蝉暗写亡国之痛，将蝉壳与亡国遗民叠印。与周密《齐天乐·蝉》重清幽物态、骆宾王《在狱咏蝉》以蝉自况不同，此词寄托最深，是《乐府补题》诸公咏物词的着眼篇目。【名句点睛】常考“病翼惊秋，枯形阅世”以枯形写遗民身世；“铜仙铅泪似洗，叹携盘去远，难贮零露”以铜仙铅泪写易代之痛。

Background

Wang Yisun, courtesy name Shengyu, hao Bishan, was a loyalist ci poet of the end of the Southern Song; after the Mongol conquest he served briefly as a minor official, but his ci mostly lodge the pain of the fallen state in objects, and he was the chief figure of the Yuefu Buzi collection. This ci, on the autumn cicada, is really on the fall of the state, written after the Song's end. The Yuefu Buzi was a collection of object-singing ci by loyalist poets of the early Yuan, using dragon-spittle incense, white lotus, the cicada, and the crab to write covertly the grief of the change of dynasties; this piece is the crown of its cicada poems. The Song fell in 1279; Bishan, having lived through the overthrow of his house, dared not write it directly, and so through the image of the cicada pressed the collective grief of the loyalist remnant onto the withered shell of the autumn cicada.

王沂孙，字圣与，号碧山，南宋末遗民词人，入元后曾任庆元路学正，然其词多托物寄亡国之痛，为《乐府补题》之主将。此词咏秋蝉，实为咏亡国，作于宋亡之后。《乐府补题》为元初遗民词人的咏物唱和集，多借龙涎香、白莲、蝉、蟹等物，暗写易代之恸，王沂孙此首即其中咏蝉的压卷。宋亡于1279年，碧山亲历家国倾覆，其词不敢直书，乃借「蝉」这一物象，把故国遗民的集体哀魂，叠印在秋蝉的残蜕之上。「齐后化蝉」的旧典，正好把个体冤恨升格为「宫魂」——一个王朝的魂魄；「铜仙铅泪」则直指亡国之痛。读此词，须把它放回遗民「说蝉实说国」的隐曲语境：蝉之「病翼惊秋、枯形阅世」，正是遗民自身「惊秋、阅世」的写照；蝉之「余音更苦」，正是故国余民的苦音。全词无一字提宋，却字字是宋——这是咏物词「寄托遥深」的极致，也是易代之际文人「不敢言而托于物」的悲凉智慧。其辞愈隐，其痛愈真，千载之下读之，犹能想见那个低头咽声、不敢仰天的时代。

Art

The art lies in the 'overlay of object and self.' The cicada is fixed as the 'palace soul' from the first line—the ghost of a fallen dynasty crying on the branch. The first half writes its voice and bearing in the verbs choke, move, pour, and in the music of pendants and zheng, and the faded beauty of its temple-hair. The second half turns to the cicada's dying and the state's fall: 'the Bronze Immortal's leaden tears wash down like rain' brings the allusion of the fallen state; 'the sick wing startles at the autumn, the withered form reads the ages' is the loyalist surviving the fall, 'how many sunsets can it endure' the remnant's endurance; and 'the lingering note is the bitterer' the cry of the remnant people. The close, 'in vain I think of the warm wind, the thousand threads of the willow,' remembers the summer past in the desolate autumn—the memory of the fallen state. Not a single word names the Song, yet every word is the Song—the extreme of 'deep-entrusted meaning' in the ci of objects.

此词艺术上最称绝者，在于「物我叠印」的咏物法——不是简单地借物起兴，而是让蝉的生命与遗民的生命完全重合，蝉即人，人即蝉。起句「一襟余恨宫魂断」，以「齐后化蝉」之典把蝉定为「宫魂」，从第一句起，蝉就不再是虫，而是亡国冤魂的化身；「年年翠阴庭树」写蝉之年年悲啼，实写遗民岁岁之痛。上片写蝉之声态：「乍咽凉柯，还移暗叶，重把离愁深诉」，以「咽」「移」「诉」三个动词，把蝉写得如一个含愁低诉的女子；「怪瑶佩流空，玉筝调柱」以佩声筝韵喻蝉鸣，极写其声之凄美；「镜暗妆残，为谁娇鬓尚如许」则以女子揽镜问妆，暗写蝉之「娇鬓」与遗民「妆残」的身世之悲。下片转写蝉之将亡与国之已亡：「铜仙铅泪似洗」引出亡国典，「病翼惊秋，枯形阅世」写蝉亦写人，「谩想薰风，柳丝千万缕」以夏日薰风反衬秋之凄楚，余痛悠长。全词通体比兴，无一字脱离蝉，又无一字真在写蝉，是咏物词「不即不离、寄托遥深」的典范；与姜夔咏蟋蟀尚存人间暖意不同，碧山蝉满纸枯寂，正见遗民词独有的「冷」与「苦」。

Allusions

The ci's allusions all circle the cicada and the fall of the state. First, 'the palace soul': according to the Zhonghua Gujin Zhu, the Qi queen, resentful, died and was transformed into a cicada crying on the courtyard tree, and so the cicada was called the 'Qi lady' or 'palace soul.' Wang Yisun takes this allusion to fix the cicada as the soul of the Qi queen—the soul of a palace, the ghost of a dynasty crying on the branch. Second, 'the Bronze Immortal's leaden tears': from Li He's 'Song of the Bronze Immortal Taking Leave of the Han,' where the bronze figure, moved to Wei by the Wei emperor, wept tears like leaden water; 'the Bronze Immortal's leaden tears wash down like rain, alas, the plate is carried far away, and can no longer hold the dew' points directly to the fall of the Song and the taking of its ritual vessels—the plate gone, even the dew the cicada drinks is no more.

此词用典皆围绕「蝉」与「亡国」，最要者三。其一「宫魂」，出《中华古今注》：齐王后怨王而死，尸化为蝉，登庭树而鸣，故称蝉为「齐女」或「宫魂」。碧山取此典，把蝉定为「齐后之魂」，既切咏蝉，更把蝉之悲鸣升格为「宫」中冤魂——一个王朝的魂魄在枝头悲啼，个体冤恨由此化为故国集体哀魂，寄托愈隐而痛愈深。其二「铜仙铅泪」，出李贺《金铜仙人辞汉歌》：魏明帝迁汉武帝承露盘，铜人临去泣下，李贺写「忆君清泪如铅水」。碧山以「铜仙铅泪似洗，叹携盘去远，难贮零露」，直指宋亡、国器被迁之痛——承露盘既去，连蝉赖以饮的零露都无从贮存，亡国之惨可见。以汉喻宋，是遗民诗的惯例。其三「清商」，清商为古乐府调名，其声凄清，碧山以「独抱清商」写蝉鸣之凄楚，亦暗喻遗民独抱的亡国清音。三典一线：宫魂写冤，铜仙写亡，清商写音，蝉的物象被完全「人化」「国化」，是《乐府补题》「借物起兴、寄托遥深」用典法的集中体现。

Commentary

This ci has always been regarded as the peak of the Southern Song loyalists' ci on objects. Zhou Ji of the Qing, in his Selection of the Four Great Ci Poets of the Song, made Wang Yisun one of the great masters of the ci of objects, praising his 'thought and brush both peerless,' and said that 'in the ci of objects the deepest contest is in the entrustment of meaning'—and Bishan's art here is precisely the depth of hidden entrustment. Liang Qichao of the modern age, reading the Yuefu Buzi, praised the pain of 'wandering in the fallen state,' holding that Bishan's object-pieces 'turn the deep grief of the fallen state into the moans of insects, fish, and grasses'—and this ci is its representative. Chen Tingzhuo of the Qing, though he found Bishan's 'hidden sighing not always profound,' admitted that his words 'bleed in every character.'

此词历来被视为南宋遗民咏物词的巅峰，论者多重其与《乐府补题》诸作的关系。清人周济《宋四家词选》推王沂孙为咏物词一大宗，谓其「思笔可谓双绝」，又云「咏物最争托意」，碧山此词正以托意之隐而深。近人梁启超读《乐府补题》，独赏其中「故国卧游」之痛，以为碧山诸咏「把亡国的沉痛，化作虫鱼草木的呻吟」，此词即其代表。清人陈廷焯《白雨斋词话》虽嫌碧山「寄慨处亦不深厚」，然亦不能不承认其「字字沁血」。与周密、张炎同咏秋蝉、蟋蟀相较，碧山的独特在「枯」与「苦」：周密重写物态之清，张炎写身世之淡，碧山则写亡国之恸，满纸「病翼惊秋，枯形阅世」。今人读遗民词，常以「说蝉实说国」概括此篇——表面秋虫哀鸣，内里故国余痛。平心而论，此词之价值，正在于它示范了易代之际文人「不敢言而托于物」的抒情策略：当直书成为危险，物象便成了最安全的容器，盛满了一个时代最低抑的哭声。这种「寄托遥深」，既是艺术，也是生存。

Prosody

Form Tune 'Joy of All Heaven' (double, oblique rhymes, long ci of objects)词·齐天乐（双调，仄韵体，咏物长调）

Rhyme The ci rhymes on oblique tones: shu, su, zhu, xu, lu, du, chu, lü, largely the fourth rhyme-group of the ci, rising and falling tones joined, the sound choked and bleak, fitting the grief of the fallen state本词押仄韵，树、诉、柱、许、露、度、楚、缕等字，大抵属词韵第四部（语、麌、遇等）上、去声通协，声情幽咽凄清，宜写亡国之痛。

Tone pattern 'Joy of All Heaven' is a long tune with varied line-lengths and tones fixed by the score; this ci uses many leading words (now, and, strange, alas, why, in vain) to lift and turn the lines, making the long tune flow《齐天乐》为长调，句法参差错落，平仄依谱而定。此词多用领字（乍、还、怪、叹、甚、谩）提挈，使比兴之气连贯；上片「乍咽凉柯，还移暗叶」与下片「病翼惊秋，枯形阅世」略具对仗之致，声情由凄美转入枯寂。

Reading note The long tune's many leading words carry the turn after turn of the poet's grief, the choked sound fitting the fallen state.《齐天乐》本宜写秋声幽怨，碧山此词以仄韵通协（语、遇部上、去声），发音短促低回，如寒蝉之息，正合「余恨」「余音更苦」的基调。起句「一襟余恨宫魂断」平起直入，奠定幽咽之调；过片「铜仙铅泪似洗」以领字振起，转入亡国浩叹，声情由蝉之凄美跌入国之枯寂。句法上最值得注意的是通体比兴：无一字脱离蝉（咽、移、诉、翼、形、音），却又无一字真在写蝉（宫魂、铜仙、清商皆国事），使声律始终在「物」的壳里运转，而「意」在壳外盘旋。这种以仄韵束住翻腾之痛、以领字串起比兴的章法，正是《乐府补题》咏物词「寄托遥深」的声律化呈现——读者听到的，是秋蝉的残吟，也是故国余民的清商。

Line by line

一襟余恨宫魂断，

A lapful of lingering hate, the palace soul is broken; (The opening fixes the cicada as the 'palace soul' from the first line—in the ancient tale the Qi queen turned into a cicada; from the first the cicada is no insect but the ghost of a fallen dynasty.)

一腔余恨如齐后魂断，

A lap of lingering grief, the palace soul broken,

起句七个字，是全词的总纲，也是咏物词「物我叠印」的最决绝一笔。「一襟余恨」写人的满怀遗恨，「宫魂断」却把蝉定为「齐后之魂」——据《中华古今注》，齐王后怨死化为蝉，故蝉本就是「宫中冤魂」。碧山把人的「余恨」与蝉的「宫魂」焊在一起，从第一句起，蝉就不再是虫，而是亡国冤魂在枝头悲啼。妙在「断」字：魂之断，既指蝉鸣的凄绝如断魂，更指故国已断、君臣已散的死别。这一句的价值，在于它用最典雅的典故，完成了最沉痛的赋值——表面上在咏物，实际上已经把整首词的抒情主体，从「蝉」偷换成了「宋遗民」。后面所有的「咽」「移」「诉」「病翼」「枯形」，都是从这个「宫魂断」里长出来的。读此句当知：咏物词的高下，往往就在起句这一「断」里见分晓。

The opening seven characters, the whole ci's outline, and the ode-to-thing ci's thing-and-self-overprint's most decisive stroke. A lap of lingering grief, the palace soul broken writes the man's breast of leftover grief, and the palace-soul-broken fixing the cicada as the Queen of Qi's soul — per the Ancient and Modern Notes, the Queen of Qi, dying in resentment, turned into a cicada, hence the cicada by nature the palace wronged soul. Bishan welding the man's leftover grief and the cicada's palace soul together, from the first line the cicada no longer the insect, but the national-perishing wronged soul wailing on the branch. The wonder in the word broken: the soul's break, at once naming the cicada's plaintive cry as if the soul snapped, and the old country's breaking and the ruler-minister's dispersion death-parting. This line's value lies in its using the most elegant allusion to complete the most grief-stricken assignment — on the surface the ode to the thing, in truth already stealing the whole ci's lyric subject from the cicada to the Song leftover subject. All the later choke, shift, complain, sick wings, withered form, all grown from this palace-soul-broken. Reading this line one should know: the ode-to-thing ci's high and low, often seen precisely in the opening's one broken.

乍咽凉柯，还移暗叶，

Now it chokes on the cool branch, now moves to the dark leaf, (The three verbs choke, move, pour make the cicada a woman grieving in a low voice, pouring out its parting grief anew, the cry of the fallen dynasty.)

忽咽凉枝，又移暗叶，

Suddenly choking on the cold branch, then shifting to the hidden leaves,

这一句写蝉的动态，却是用写人的笔法在写蝉，是「物我叠印」的细腻处。「乍咽」写蝉声忽止，如人语噎在喉头；「凉柯」点秋枝之冷，亦是身世之凉；「还移暗叶」写蝉在叶间潜行，如遗民在乱世中辗转藏身。三个动作（咽、移、诉）连贯而下，把一只秋蝉写得像一个含愁低诉、惊惶不安的女子——而这女子，分明就是易代之际「妆残」「惊秋」的故国孀妇。尤为巧妙的是「凉」与「暗」二字：凉是触觉的秋，暗是视觉的危，合起来是一种无处容身的凄惶。碧山不写蝉飞高枝、不写蝉鸣得意，专写它的「咽」与「移」，正是因为遗民的生命姿态，本就是压低了声音、躲进了暗处的。以物写人至此，已分不清是在看蝉，还是在照自己。

This line writes the cicada's motion, and yet uses the man-writing brush for the cicada, the thing-and-self-overprint's delicate place. Suddenly choking on the cold branch writes the cicada's sudden silence, like the human speech choked in the throat; the cold branch naming the autumn bough's chill, also the fate's coldness; then shifting to the hidden leaves writes the cicada's creeping among the leaves, like the leftover subject's tossing and hiding in the chaotic age. The three motions (choke, shift, complain) flowing on together, writing one autumn cicada like a woman bearing grief and murmuring, startled and uneasy — and this woman, clearly the dynasty-change era's makeup-tattered and autumn-startled old-country widow. The especially clever in the two words cold and dark: the cold the touch of autumn, the dark the sight of danger, together a nowhere-to-lodge desolation. Bishan not writing the cicada's flying the high branch, not the cicada's complacent cry, only writing its choke and shift, precisely because the leftover subject's life posture, by nature the lowered voice and the hidden corner. Writing the man through the thing to this point, already indistinguishable whether watching the cicada, or looking at oneself in the glass.

铜仙铅泪似洗，

The Bronze Immortal's leaden tears wash down like rain, (The allusion of the fallen state: from Li He's poem, the bronze figure weeping as its dew-plate was carried away, the plate gone and even the dew the cicada drinks no more.)

铜仙铅泪如洗，

The bronze immortal's leaden tears, as if washed,

这一句是全词亡国之痛的引爆点，也是用典「以汉喻宋」的关键。「铜仙铅泪」出李贺《金铜仙人辞汉歌》：汉武帝承露盘被魏明帝迁走，铜人临去泣下如铅。碧山借这一典，把宋亡、国器被迁的惨痛，凝在「铅泪似洗」四字里——「似洗」写泪之多、之无尽，也写泪之冷（铅色灰白）。妙在它接在咏蝉的上下文里：蝉本依赖零露而活（「难贮零露」紧承其后），承露盘一去，蝉连活命的露都没有了，正如遗民连故国都失去了。铜仙之泪，既是汉之泪，也是宋之泪，更是碧山自己的泪。这一典的厉害，在于它把一个王朝的覆灭，写成了一个「物」的被迁、一滴「泪」的流淌，举重若轻，却重逾千钧。读此句当知，遗民词最痛处，往往不在「哭」，而在这种借古物之泪，悄悄洗过今人之心。

This line is the ci's national-grief detonation point, and the allusion's Han-figures-Song key. The bronze immortal's leaden tears, as if washed comes from Li He's The Bronze Immortal Takes Leave of Han: Emperor Wu's dew-bearing plate removed by Wei Mingdi, the bronze man at leaving weeping leaden tears. Bishan borrowing this allusion, condensing the Song's perishing and the national vessel's removal pain into the leaden-tears-as-if-washed four characters — the as-if-washed writing the tears' number and endlessness, and the tears' cold (the lead's gray-white). The wonder in its following the cicada-ode context: the cicada by nature living on the falling dew (the hard-to-hold-the-falling-dew immediately inheriting), the dew-bearing plate once gone, the cicada even the life-sustaining dew no longer has, just as the leftover subject even the old country lost. The bronze immortal's tears, at once Han's tears, and Song's tears, and Bishan's own tears. This allusion's force lies in its writing a dynasty's ruin as one thing's removal and one tear's flowing, the heavy borne lightly, and yet heavier than a thousand jun. Reading this line one should know, the leftover ci's most grief-stricken place, often not in the crying, but in this kind of borrowing the old thing's tears, quietly washing over the modern man's heart.

谩想薰风，柳丝千万缕。

In vain I think of the warm wind, the thousand threads of the willow. (The close remembers the summer past in the desolate autumn—the memory of the fallen state, the warm wind and the willow threads of a time that can never return.)

空想薰风，柳丝千万缕。

Vainly I think of the warm south wind, the willow threads ten thousand strands.

结句是全词最悠长的一声叹息，也是「以乐景写哀」的反衬收法。「薰风」即夏风，柳丝千万缕是夏日的繁盛温柔；而蝉（与遗民）身处秋之凄楚，所「想」的薰风，已是再也回不去的盛世春光。「谩想」二字极重——「谩」是空、是徒然，想也是白想，故国如薰风，永不可再。这与起句「宫魂断」形成闭环：魂断于秋，而空想于夏，首尾之间，是一只蝉、一代人从盛到亡的全部距离。柳丝「千万缕」越是绵长柔美，越反衬出眼前的「枯形阅世」「余音更苦」之不堪。这一收法，不写痛而痛自深，不写亡而亡自见，是咏物词「寄托遥深」的收穴。读此句当品那一份「空想」的绝望——不是不知道回不去，而是明知回不去，仍忍不住想，想罢，只剩柳丝在风里，与自己无关。

The close is the ci's longest sigh, and the delighted-scene-sets-off-grief contrast close. The warm south wind means the summer wind, the willow threads ten thousand strands the summer's lush softness; and the cicada (and the leftover subject) dwelling in autumn's bitterness, the thought warm south wind, already the unrecoverable prosperous-spring light. The two words vain-thought the weight extreme — the vain the empty and the futile, the thinking also the white thinking, the old country like the warm south wind, forever no return. This with the opening's palace-soul-broken forming the closed loop: the soul broken in autumn, and the vain thought in summer, between head and tail, one cicada and one generation's whole distance from splendor to ruin. The willow threads' ten thousand strands the longer and softer, the more it sets off the present's withered-form-sees-the-world and the lingering-sound-the-bitterer's unbearable. This close, not writing the pain and the pain self-deep, not writing the ruin and the ruin self-seen, the ode-to-thing ci's far-reaching-lodging close. Reading this line one should savor that vain-thought's despair — not the not-knowing the no-return, but the knowing the no-return and yet the unable-to-help-thinking, and after the thinking, only the willow threads in the wind, unrelated to oneself.

Study

Word focus

宫魂 The palace soul. From the tale of the Qi queen turned into a cicada crying on the courtyard tree; Wang Yisun fixes the cicada as the soul of a palace, the ghost of a dynasty crying on the branch, the individual's resentment become the collective grief of the fallen state. 「宫魂」二字，是全词托意的总开关，也是碧山「说蝉实说国」的密钥。它出自齐王后化蝉之典，本指蝉为宫中怨魂所化；碧山取之，等于在起句就把蝉的身世，从「虫」改写为「亡国冤魂」。这一词的妙处，在于「宫」字——宫，是王朝、是后妃、是故国宫廷的象征；把蝉称为「宫魂」，蝉的每一声鸣，都成了故国宫廷余魄的啼血。个体（齐后）的冤，由此升格为集体（宋室）的哀，寄托愈隐而痛愈深。与寻常咏蝉仅写「清露」「高洁」不同，碧山独取「魂断」一脉，使物象从一开始就被「人化」「国化」。两个字，完成了整首词抒情主体的偷换，是遗民咏物「不敢言而托于物」最精炼的体现。

铜仙铅泪 The Bronze Immortal's leaden tears. From Li He's poem, the bronze figure weeping as its dew-collecting plate was carried away; the emblem of the fallen state whose ritual vessels are taken, the grief of the state's fall in one image. 「铜仙铅泪」四字，是此词亡国之痛最凝缩的意象，也是「以汉喻宋」用典法的典范。李贺写金铜仙人辞汉，碧山写它，重心不在典事本身，而在「铅泪」二字——铅色灰冷，泪如铅水，既是铜人之泪，也是遗民之泪，更是故国（宋）之泪。妙在它嵌在咏蝉语境里：「铜仙铅泪似洗，叹携盘去远，难贮零露」，承露盘既被迁走，蝉便无零露可饮，正如遗民失去故国便失去依凭。一个「洗」字写泪之不尽，一个「去远」写国之已亡、不可追还。这四个字把宏大的亡国叙事，收进了一尊被迁的铜像、一滴灰冷的泪里，举重若轻而重逾千钧。它是全词由「咏蝉」跨向「写亡国」的桥，也是碧山词「字字沁血」的标本。

清商 The clear shang tone. The cold note of autumn music; 'why alone hugging the clear shang tone, it turns at once to desolate grief'—the cicada's bitter cry, the note of the remnant people of the fallen state. 「清商」本为古乐府调名，其声凄清哀怨，曹丕《燕歌行》即有「援琴鸣弦发清商」。碧山以「甚独抱清商，顿成凄楚」写蝉鸣，是以乐调写虫鸣，更是以「遗民之音」写「故国之痛」。妙在「独抱」二字——蝉（遗民）独自抱着这一脉清商，无人共听、无人相和，正如故国既亡，那一腔清音只剩自己独守。「清商」在此已不仅是声音，而是遗民独抱的文化记忆与忠愤之声，是「宫魂」在音乐层面的回响。与起句「宫魂断」、下片「铜仙铅泪」构成「魂—泪—音」的三重寄托，蝉的物象被完全「国化」。两个字，把一只秋虫的哀鸣，升格为一个时代最低抑、最不肯散去的清音。