浣溪沙
　　晏殊
　　一曲新词酒一杯，去年天气旧亭台，夕阳西下几时回。
　　无可奈何花落去，似曾相识燕归来，小园香径独徘徊。
　　To the tune of a washing silk stream
　　Poem by Yan Shu
　　Translation by Yang Zhiming
　　
　　In my old small garden,
　　I am enjoying a cup of wine,
　　while a maid singing a new melody,
　　And the weather like last year’s so fine.
　　I cannot but ask the setting sun,
　　“When will you appear again?”
　　Then I only find,
　　The flowers are helplessly falling,
　　Seemingly familiar swallows returning;
　　Myself on a petal covered path strolling.
　　Translator’s notes:
　　
　　1.浣溪沙(huan4xi1sha1) same as 浣纱溪 （huan4sha1xi1）“A Silk- Washing Stream”, was a title of a piece of music produced in the music institute of Tang Dynasty. And it was based on the story of Xishi, (a charming beauty who washed silk in the stream.). It was used as a lyric genre title in Song Dynasty. A lyric at the very beginning could be sung as a song so it had the music to go with it. Then a lyric was written according to the music and vice versa. Therefore a lyric genre title was chosen generally according to the content of the lyric. But later on a lyric was written only in line with a lyric genre title and this title gradually became indifferent to the content of the lyric except the patterned poetic form including rhyme, rhythm and fixed number of words with a certain ping1ze4 scheme.
　　
　　2.香径(xiang1jing4),( literarily a fragrant path ) a path covered with fallen petals.
　　
　　
　　Commentary:
　　
　　A.E. Housman, a celebrated English poet compares writings of poetry to the secretions of an injured oyster, which result in a pearl. Indeed this piece is one of the brightest pearls in over 100 lyrics composed by Yan Shu. Its diction is as simple as everyday language without anything overwrought. But the theme and imagery it creates are profound.
　　
　　In this lyric the poet shows his mood through a picture in which at sunset flowers are falling and some swallows are back to their old nest, which tells that another year is over and things will soon start anew again.
　　
　　In the first stanza the persona takes pleasure in a cup of wine while listening to his maid singing a new song as he wonders when the sun will come back after it is set. In the second stanza he realizes that a new year begins as the swallows are back and flowers wither though once they are in blossoms.
　　
　　The poet enjoys a great popularity for the couplet: “The flowers are helplessly falling, Seemingly familiar swallows returning;” in which a kind of philosophy of life is implied. And a reader could easily find it out as he knows clearly that the “flowers’ falling and the swallows’ coming “ is governed by the law of nature. In natural world when it happens like this it can’t help. However once flowers, “symbol of beauty”, vanish it does not mean the world will be into the ewigkeit for something gorgeous may be revealed. And this revealment is not a simple repetition of the past but it is something “Seemingly familiar”. The whole world goes and all creatures evolve in this direction. Who knows it is not a blessing in disguise. So is in human world. During one’s life there is always something helpless. Towards disasters like recent tsunami in Indian Ocean we feel helpless, to life itself we are so weak that we cannot control it as it has ups and downs and sometimes it is very short when death comes suddenly. Still we could benefit from a lot of good things while alive and “Seemingly familiar” dreamland could appear once a while as long as we treasure all little pleasures of life. Is the persona thinking about all this while he is pacing to and fro his passageway full of dead flowers?
　　
　　About the poet:
　　Yan Shu (991-1055), was a native of Linchuan, Fuzhou (present-day Fuzhou, Jiangxi Province). It is said that he began writing essays when he was only 7, for which he won all the admirations as he was considered as a prodigy. He won a title of Jinshi at the age of 14. Then he was promoted to a position of an official in charge of imperial mandate and became the prime minister when the emperor Renzong was in power. Since he was so successful in his civil service that he had lived a noble and happy life throughout his 64 years in this world.
　　
　　As he was recognized for his talents in writing when he was a child he had made one of the most outstanding lyric composers and great scholars in early Northern Song Dynasty. His lyrics are largely concerned about love, wine drinking, outing and things of a fine life. The diction of his lyrics is beautiful, the sound harmonious, the craftsmanship sophisticated, and the imagery fresh and lively.