Tribute to Du Fu

1、Life as Advisor for Xichuan Governor

Autumn chilled well-side Phoenix trees,

I lodged alone with ashen candle lights.

---Du Fu: Lodging at Governor’s Office

Busy were Du Fu’s days at the Governor’s’ Office. At daybreak

The Central Plains area was in turmoil, and you told me not to show my concern
For fear of staff’s sneer. A poet suffering tuberculosis and malaria
Held himself together proudly, dozing at the desk, swords and spears rusty
And befriending robbers. You were then fifty-three, wearing an ugly uniform, and I, thirty-nine, running every day

And on occasions of poetry reading, I read verses irrelevant of my times

My heart ached on thought of your gray hair, and melancholy broke down in Chengdu like a fast-running horse
All advisors at the Xichuan Governor’s Office were fat, but you were thin , and remained so throughout your life

Then you had enough to eat at least. It’s Arthralgia that made you howl at midnight, howling for being out

There were dried moths in your verse books, and field mice scurry in the yard
When the frustrated poet returned home, the old dog came to greet licking his blouse, and the neighbors welcomed him with wine in gourds
Deserted but overjoyed, Du Fu saw his wife's face wet with tears

2、Life in the Thatched Cottage

Fruits always given to the poor in high autumn,

Flowers tenderly soothing the eyes next year.

---Du Fu: Ode to Peach Blossoms

The five peach trees near the thatched cottage looked like five maids of the Tang Dynasty

Du Fu loved their pink faces. This cottage owner was an expert in exile

Surviving the Emperor and warhorses, the disfigured Kingdom and mountains & rivers, he opened a book on the Huanhua Creek，

Dug a well under the palm-tree, and built a channel alongside the bamboo, when the five peach trees blossomed and yielded fruits one after another

Swallows were dancing in the wind and gulls floating on the water

Their faces looked somewhat like those of the refugees

With the same red noses, and feet struggling in the water.

In wartime, it’s natural for people to love each other

Gulls and swallows, one on the water, the other frozen in midair

Du Fu’s wife was napping in a bamboo chair. Who's shooting? Who’s crying for help from the wine jar?

Was the cottage the barn of poetry? Poetry and life, regardless of the dynasty

When one stayed dazed on the water, the other would stay frozen in midair

3、Life in Exile

Gray hairs get shorter with hand tickle,

Failing all efforts to arrange with comb.

--Du Fu: Spring Hope

After midnight of June 12, Emperor Xuanzong exited from the Yanqiu Gate with the corrupt Prime Minister and one Imperial Concubine

And fled to West Sichuan. The people in Chang'an City were sleeping unfed

Du Fu trotted among the army and horses, and he was capable of running that year

Though he fell ill two years later. In his poetry Tarragon grew out of the Li’s Kingdom

His motherland bumping on horseback, the poet was in a bird's mouth

His hungry daughter cried for food, while his boy took Du Fu by the back legs begging to write a family letter

Death beat poetry, and the Emperor led the flight out of the country

It was a torturous dynasty, when gray hairs refused to grow

Du Fu pushed open the door of his friend Sun Zai's hut at dusk and saw a basin of steaming water for footwashing

Lights, candles, and food were there to greet the bewildered fugitives

Later the Mongols took Du Fu alive in the crowd

At forty-five he had gray hairs, despite he was afterwards praised in the history books

For being firm among the turmoil. Unfortunately, his fellow poet Wang Wei was taken to Luoyang

Chang'an, ah, Chang'an! The people spilt their guts, while the poet burned himself out

4、Ten Years in Chang'an

Red chambers stank of rotten wine and meat,

Roadside lay scattered bones of frozen deaths.

--Du Fu: A Lament from Chang’an to Fengxian County

An Lushan bumped into Du Fu in the bathroom of a Chang'an Inn

A fat robber and an angry poet squeezed in the same dynasty

Such a dramatic arrangement is something I would like to see. And I

A bookworm, carrying a pot of liquor, hurried from Tanzhou to Chang'an for the Imperial Examination

Du Fu studied the officialdom for ten years, and wrote laboriously poems for the Emperor

He was a weaponry guard under the Prince. When the drought happened, Du Fu had his two fingers frozen and broken

Not until forty-four with a thinner belly, he was appointed a petty official

While listening to Emperor Xuanzong singing on Mount Li, Du Fu thought of the people

The saddened people, and his child under the age of one who died of starvation

Du Fu ran to the foot of Mount Li and wept bitterly. But he’s lucky not having to pay taxes

Not having to go enlisting. Luckier than me, isn’t it?

You played your role, and let me count out the bones frozen to death in Chang’an City

People cried all the way to Fengxian County, and in your cry were bones frozen to death

Rotten wine and meat stank, and the grief of the prosperous Tang Dynasty topped the ZhongNan Mountains

Over the ten years, Du Fu wrote poetry for the Emperor during first nine years, and fled Chang’an City in the last year.

5、Chang'an Regained

Joy fills up the city, while children shout and cry;

Every family sells hairpins, for buying fragrant wine.

---Du Fu: Verse on Hearing Recovery of Lost City

Chang'an in chaos, the poet’s on his fugitive way, witnessing Fengxiang County attacked by the Mongols

The warhorses in chaos, long-lost brothers met and did not dare to recognize each other

At a deserted village, Du Fu got good news after midnight: You would be back to your office

150,000 soldiers of Tang Dynasty recaptured the city, face blackened with ashen dirts  and waists tied with straw ropes

4,000 Mongol soldiers got killed, none of whom Du Fu knew

He sat in the stable, a bronze mirror in his arms, writing a letter home

Emperor Suzong returned to the Imperial City, and Imperial Censor Cui Qi was interrogating Wang Wei in front of the Yuan Palace

And said to kill Wang, and while stupefied, Du Fu stood with cotton clothes on his shoulders

Purple smokes rose out of the burned houses. Wang was pardoned, clear of blame the next day

He wept and said to Du Fu: Listen, pal, the Imperial Court love flattery

Let’s survive the hard times with verses of bows and wows

They--Wang Wei, Cen Shen and Du Fu excused themselves of the Court night duty

But how could they reported happenings last night at the morning Imperial sessions?

The dragonfly nodded to the bitter poets, and the butterfly was the expert in flattery

Kneel down seeing the Emperor, pick them up seeing the bones

Not until years later, however, the bones were unveiled in his verses. Burning draft proposal to the Emperor,

Pawning clothes for liquor at Qu Jiang Tou, Du Fu got intoxicated with the spring breeze

Chang'an was Du Fu's Chang'an, and Du Fu, an advisor for his Majesty

Knocking on the leg of a horse in Chang'an, Du Fu recited his verses in hybrid of sadness and joy

(Tr. Li Fukang)

——————

Zhou Sese, born in Hunan, China in 1968, is a contemporary poet, novelist, painter, publisher, and a documentary director who currently lives in Beijing, China.

Sese has published a number of poetry collections, including "Under the Pines", "17 Years: Selected Poems of Zhou Sese", "Lishan Mountains", "The Storm is Coming", "How Good is the Figure of a Fish", “Moss”, “End of the World”, and “Rhinoceros”. His published fiction works include "The Apple", "Crows of Zhongguancun", "Original Taste", "Chinese Brothers" which was turned into a 30 episodes of a TV series. A collection of Sese’s paintings and calligraphy, "Zhou Sese: Poetry and Calligraphy" was published in January 2019. His poems have been translated into English, Japanese, Spanish, Swedish, French, Mongolian, Korean, and Vietnamese. Zhou Sese is the winner of multiple awards, including the first prize of the First Contest of Chinese Blog Poetry (2005), China's Most Influential Top Ten Poets of 2009, International Best Poet of 2014, China's Outstanding Poet of 2015, the 5th Chinese Laurel Poetry Award (2016), Poetry Award of 2017 Annual Outstanding Works, 2017-2018 Poetry Collection Award of the 5th China Contemporary Poetry Award, 2018 Poetry Award of Ren-Ren Literature Award. Sese is also recognized as one of the Top Ten Chinese Poets in 2018, winning Beijing Literature’s Poetry Award of Key Excellent Works of 2015-2016 and Ten Excellent Poetry Collections of 2017.

Sese is the editor-in-chief of Kaqiu poetry magazine and the co-editor of a number of poetry anthologies, including Chinese Poetry Anthology in the New Millennium, The Leaderboard of Chinese Poetry (annual series), The Poems We Have Read in Those Years, Read Good Poems, Say Good Night to Children (5 Volumes), and  Chinese Contemporary Poetry Selection (in Chinese and Spanish), etc.

Zhou Sese is the founder of Lighthouse International Literature Award, Lishan Poetry Award and Kaqiu Warren Poetry Award. He is also the head of both Lishan Poetry Club and Chinese Poets Field Investigation Team.

Zhou Sese was invited to the 27th Columbia Medellin International Poetry Festival, the 7th Mexico City International Poetry Festival, the 3rd Asia-Pacific Poetry Festival, and attended the Chinese Writers' Forum held by Confucius Institute Latin American Center. He has given lectures on literature and read his poems at Neruda Foundation, Universidad Santo Tomás,Universidad Tadeo Lozano de Bogotá, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Mexico, Universidad Autónoma de Nuevo Leon,and Universidad Autónoma de Chihuahua.

Zhou Sese initiated "writing towards outdoors", "rebuilding the enlightenment spirit of Chinese poetry", and creatively started "meta  poetry writing in simple language."

His poems are published in the French LEVURE LITTERAIRE, the Mexican Periódico de Poesía, Estudios de Africa y Asia, the Medellin poetry magazine Prometheus, the Mongolian Seasons and Writers, the multi-language World Poet Quarterly, the Chinese Poetry Selection (2017 Chinese-English bilingual edition), the Homecoming and Departure--Chinese and Australian Contemporary Poetry Selection (Chinese Volume, Chinese-English bilingual), and the WORLD POETRY Yearbook 2013.

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