Classic Tang poem 清明 qing ming Pure Brightness 杜牧 Du Mu: lyrics, pinyin, English translation, audio, poem analysis, Tomb / Grave Sweeping Day, Tomb money, zhi qian, stories of Liu Bang, Li Yuan, Thursday This Side Of Brightness

清明
qingming

Pure Brightness
or
Clear Brightness

by
杜牧
Du Mu

[audio:http://www.chinesetolearn.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/listen-to2.mp3|titles=listen to]
清明时节雨纷纷，
qīngmíngshíjié yǔ fēnfēn ,
At the time of Pure Brightness Festival, the rains are drizzling ceaselessly（note 1)

路上行人欲断魂。
lùshang xíngrén yù duàn hún .
The passengers on the road look like almost soul breaking. (note 2)

借问酒家何处有，
jiè wèn jiǔjiā hé chù yǒu ,
May I ask where can I find a wine shop?

牧童遥指杏花村。
mùtóng yáo zhǐ xìnghuācūn.
The shepherd boy points at the distant Apricot Blossom Village.

Note 1:
清明 Qingming or Pure Brightness, 5th of the 24 solar terms (二十四節氣 èr shí sì jié qì). 5th-19th of April is so called Pure Brightness Festival or Tomb Sweeping Day.

Note 2:
断魂 duàn hún, literally means even soul got broken. It refers to the stage of extreme sadness of mind and heart too.

Note 3:
杏花村 xìnghuācūn, 杏 xìng is 杏树 xìngshù, apricot trees; 花 huā, flowers, blossom; 村 cūn, village. By the impact of this poem, later people associate “Xìnghua Village” with wine shop .

Translated by Shu

Poem analysis:

清明时节雨纷纷，
qīngmíngshíjié yǔ fēnfēn

The poet was on the road traveling to a destination during the Pure Brightness Festival. That day happened to be a rain drizzling day, endless rain dropped, dripped on the cover of his carriage. How would you feel if your day is a ceaseless raining day? Would you be so happy and want to dance under the rains or under the umbrella? Maybe? However, that cheerful spirit was not what the poet had at that moment. He was soul very sad …

路上行人欲断魂。
lùshang xíngrén yù duàn hún .

As his eyes saw through the path that he traveled by, he felt the passengers all looking like soul breaking. Have you ever felt the passengers on the road looked like soul breaking before? Maybe one or two seemed to be not in a good mood, but they were never as extremely as soul breaking, right? When a person is in good spirit, his or her good spirit will be reflected in whatever he or she saw. Sad people have sad eyes, and sad eyes see sad things. Why was Du Mu sad?

The reason is on Pure Brightness festival, the Chinese people will go out to the fields to sweep the graves of their ancestors, and that is why it also called Tomb Sweeping Day or Ancestors Day. It is also an annual time for all family members to reunite, dead ones and living ones, in the beautiful spring day. There is a phrase called 踏青 Tàqīng, literally it means treading the green grass, and it generally refers to have a short outing to the field. In ancient Chinese, there were no four-wheel gas cars, hence, a lot of outings people had to walk, especially for tomb sweeping. People of the same family went out together treading on the green landscape, and then they swept the tombs and putting tomb papers (墓纸 mu zhi) on the tomb area, finally offered sacrifice to their ancestors.

Speaking of tomb papers, there is a magical and touching story. Emperor Gao (256 BC or 247 BC – 1 June 195 BC), 刘邦 Liu Bang, was the founder and first emperor of the 汉 Han Dynasty, ruling over China from 202 BC to 195 BC. It is said that after he conquered the world and became the ruler, one day he went out to find his parents’ tomb to tell them the great news. However, he was out of hometown for so many years leading the army to fight the rivals, so when he went out to the place where he thought the tomb should be at, the grass of the field all were high up to knees and he was not able to find or identify which one was his parents’. He searched and searched, walked and looked, but still was not able to find it. Out of frustration, he cried and called out to the heaven and said: Dear heaven, could you please tell me where is my mom and dad’s tomb? After he said that, strangely, a huge wind was blown to the field.
Then, some idea popped into Liu Bang’s mind, he then found a paper and shredded it into pieces and silently prayed heaven above would help him, and then he called out to his parents: Dear mom and dad, please use your heaven spirit to show me where your tomb is by these papers. Then he threw all pieces of the paper to the rushing wind. All the papers were blown away by the wind, except one fell down on a very old tomb; no matter how fierce the wind, it never got blown away. Amazed by what he saw, Liu brushed away the knee-high weeds in front of the tombstone, and indeed, that was his parents’ tomb.

Besides Liu Bang, Emperor 高祖 Gaozu of 唐 Tang (566 – 25 June 635), 李淵 Li Yuan, the first emperor of Tang dynasty from 618 to 626，had a similar story about finding his parents’ tomb by the magical help of heaven, wind and paper.

You might wonder what are tomb papers for? Tomb papers are money for the dead souls to use. These days, have you ever read that people burned paper iphone for their ancestors to talk to each other? Print out paper computers for them to chat online? Even create paper racecars for them to compete on heaven highways? Everything is possible; keep your imagination up. Believe or not, I was just reading about a news about a Malaysian Chinese went to sweep his grandfather’s grave, and he offered and burned an paper ipad for his grandfather to enjoy on Tomb Sweeping Day. That night, he dreamt that his grandpa came to visit him to ask the instruction about how to use the ipad. Scared by the dream, the poor guy became ill badly. Google it, no kidding:)

借问酒家何处有，
jiè wèn jiǔjiā hé chù yǒu ,

It was supposed to be a family gather together time, however, our poet was unluckily still on the road traveling from one place to another place and was upset more and more by the continuous dripping rains. As he got gloomier, the more he felt the sadness in his chest, and no wonder he felt those people on the road looked like soul breaking as he did. What would you do if you feel that your soul is breaking gradually? It is very hurt to experience soul break, so hurt so painful. What you would do to numb the hurt and wound?

Some acetaminophen maybe, such as TYLENOL triple strength? Lucky for you that you live in the modern time. No such luck for ancient Chinese people. Most of them tried to numb their soul sadness by drinking strong wines, so now you know why he asked where to find a wine shop, instead of trying to find a bookstore or a fitness center.

牧童遥指杏花村。
mùtóng yáo zhǐ xìnghuācūn.

Luckily, there was a shepherd boy pointed to the right direction for him.
A great place to bury his sadness and escape the deepest sorrow caused by the soul breaking hurt.

山西 Shanxi 杏花村 Xinghua Village produces top liquor with mellow, rich taste. In the village, archaeologists excavated many wine tools and wine vessel of the 汉 Han Dynasty, researchers suggest that since the Northern 魏 Wei Dynasty about 1,500 years ago, large-scale liquor brewing was developed there. To the 唐 Tang Dynasty, it said that this village had 72 wine shops. The wine of Xinghua Village became famous for it appeared in poetry countless times. Great poets 李白 Li Bai and 杜甫 Du Fu drank wine there. Du Mu’s “Qingming” poem further made Xinghua Village a household name. It is said that Xinghua Village now has over two hundred wine shops or more.

I hope you enjoy reading this poem, I certainly did:) To make the post funner,
let’s read another poem with similar structure but different topic.

There was a Chinese scientist 卢嘉锡 Lu Xijia, once he complained that it was so hard to find a publisher to publish his academic research work. Out of frustration and out of boredom, he wrote the following poem：

[audio:http://www.chinesetolearn.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/listen-to3.mp3|titles=listen to]
绞尽脑汁泪纷纷,
jiǎojìnnǎozhī lèi fēnfēn ,
While I was racking my brain, my tears dripped and dripped ceaselessly,

出版无门欲断魂。
chūbǎn wú Mén Yùduàn hún .
There is no way to publish my book, and it makes me feel like soul breaking.

借问尊书何处卖？
jiè wèn zūn shū hé chù mài ?
May I ask where do you sell your books?

秀才遥指自家门。
xiùcáiyáo zhǐ zì jiāmén .
The scholar points to his own house faraway. (note 1)

(note 1)
秀才 xiùcái, a person who has passed the county level imperial exam.

Poet Du Mu background information:

杜牧 Du Mu (803–852) was a famous poet of the late Tang Dynasty. Du’s courtesy name was Muzhi 牧之, and sobriquet Fanchuan (樊川).

Du Mu was born in 长安 Chang’an (modern 西安 Xi’an) into a noble family whose fortunes were declining. He passed the 进士 jinshi，successful candidate in the highest imperial civil service examination，in 827 at the age of 25, and went on to work for many official positions in various places through years. Sadly, he was not able to achieve a prominent rank.

Du Mu was talented in writing 诗 shi （poetry), 赋 fu (poetic essay) and ancient Chinese prose (散文 san wen). He is best known as the writer of lyrical sensual quatrains about historical sites or themes of separation, decadence, or impermanence. He also wrote long narrative poems, commentary on the Art of War and many letters of advice to high rank officials in the court.

Du Mu and 李商隐 Li Shangyin （ca. 813–858) both were pinnacle poets of their time in the late Tang, and their names were usually mentioned together and recognized as the Little Li-Du (小李杜), in contrast to the Great Li-Du 大李杜: 李白 Li Bai （701 – 762） and 杜甫 Du Fu （712–770）.

Thursday This Side Of Brightness