书城外语课外英语-古诗精选(双语版)
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第10章 七言古诗(5)

Above,he searched the Green Void,below,the Yellow Spring;

But he failed,in either place,to find the one he looked for.

And then he heard accounts of an enchanted isle at sea,

A part of the intangible and incorporeal world,

With pavilions and fine towers in the fivecoloured air,

And of exquisite immortals moving to and fro,

And of one among themwhom they called The Ever True—

With a face of snow and flowers resembling hers he sought.

So he went to the West Halls gate of gold and knocked at the jasper door

And asked a girl,called MorselOfJade,to tell The DoublyPerfect.

And the lady,at news of an envoy from the Emperor of China,

Was startled out of dreams in her nineflowered,canopy.

She pushed aside her pillow,dressed,shook away sleep,

And opened the pearly shade and then the silver screen.

Her cloudy hairdress hung on one side because of her great haste,

And her flowercap was loose when she came along the terrace,

While a light wind filled her cloak and fluttered with her motion

As though she danced The Rainbow Skirt and the Feathered Coat.

And the teardrops drifting down her sad white face

Were like a rain in spring on the blossom of the pear.

But love glowed deep within her eyes when she bade him thank her liege,

Whose form and voice had been strange to her ever since their parting—

Since happiness had ended at the Court of the Bright Sun,

And moons and dawns had become long in FairyMountain Palace.

But when she turned her face and looked down toward the earth

And tried to see the capital,there were only fog and dust.

So she took out,with emotion,the pledges he had given

And,through his envoy,sent him back a shell box and gold hairpin,

But kept one branch of the hairpin and one side of the box,

Breaking the gold of the hairpin,breaking the shell of the box;

“Our souls belong together,”she said,“like this gold and this shell—

Somewhere,sometime,on earth or in heaven,we shall surely

And she sent him,by his messenger,a sentence reminding him

Of vows which had been known only to their two hearts:

“On the seventh day of the seventh month,in the Palace of Long Life,

We told each other secretly in the quiet midnight world

That we wished to fly in heaven,two birds with the wings of one,

And to grow together on the earth,two branches of one tree.”

Earth endures,heaven endures;some time both shall end,

While this unending sorrow goes on and on for ever.

李商隐

李商隐(813?~858?),字义山,号玉溪生,怀州河内(今河南泌阳)人,唐代诗人。开成进士,曾任县尉、秘书郎和东川节度使判官等职。因受牛李党争影响,被人排挤,潦倒终身。

其诗揭露和批判当时藩镇割据、宦官擅权和上层统治集团的腐朽糜烂,《行次西郊一百韵》、《有感二首》、《重有感》等皆著名。所作咏史诗多托古以斥时政,《贾生》、《隋宫》、《富平少侯》等较突出。无题诗也有所寄寓,至其实义,诸家所释不一。擅长律绝,富于文采,构思精密,情致婉曲,具有独特风格。然有用典太多,意旨隐晦之病。也工四六文。有《李义山诗集》,文集已散轶,后人辑有《樊南文集》、《樊南文集补编》。

韩碑

元和天子神武姿,彼何人哉轩与羲。

誓将上雪列圣耻,坐法宫中朝四夷。

淮西有贼五十载,封狼生貔貔生罴。

不据山河据平地,长戈利矛日可麾。

帝得圣相相曰度,贼斫不死神扶持。

腰悬相印作都统,阴风惨澹天王旗。

愬武古通作牙爪,仪曹外郎载笔随。

行军司马智且勇,十四万众犹虎貔。

入蔡缚贼献太庙,功无与让恩不訾。

帝曰汝度功第一,汝从事愈宜为辞。

愈拜稽首蹈且舞:金石刻画臣能为。

古者世称大手笔,此事不系于职司。

当仁自古有不让,言讫屡颔天子颐。

公退斋戒坐小阁,濡染大笔何淋漓。

点窜尧典舜典字,涂改清庙生民诗。

文成破体书在纸,清晨再拜铺丹墀。

表曰臣愈昧死上,咏神圣功书之碑。

碑高三丈字如斗,负以灵鳌蟠以螭。

句奇语重喻者少,谗之天子言其私。

长绳百尺拽碑倒,粗砂大石相磨治。

公子斯文若元气,先时已入人肝脾。

汤盘孔鼎有述作,今无其器存其辞。

呜呼圣王及圣相,相与赫赫流淳熙。

公之斯文不示后,曷与三五相攀追。

愿书万本颂万过,口角流沫右手胝。

传之七十有二代,以为封禅玉检明堂基。

The Han Monument

The Son of Heaven in Yuanhe times was martial as a god

And might be liked only to the Emperors Xuan and Xi.

He took an oath to reassert the glory of the empire,

And tribute was brought to his palace from all four quarters.

Western Huai for fifty years had been a bandit country,

Wolves becoming lynxes,lynxes becoming bears.

They assailed the mountains and rivers,rising from the plains,

With their long spears and sharp lances aimed at the Sun.

But the Emperor had a wise premier,by the name of Du,

Who,guarded by spirits against assassination,

Hong at his girdle the seal of state,and accepted chief command,

While these savage winds were harrying the flags of the Ruler of Heaven.

Generals Suo,Wu,Gu,and Tong became his paws and claws;

Civil and military experts brought their writing brushes,

And his recording adviser was wise and resolute.

A hundred and forty thousand soldiers,fighting like lions and tigers,

Captured the bandit chieftains for the Imperial Temple.

So complete a victory was a supreme event;

And the Emperor said:“To you,Du,should go the highest honour,

And your secretary,Yu,should write a record of it.”

When Yu had bowed his head,he leapt and danced,saying:

“Historical writings on stone and metal are my especial art;

And,since I know the finest brushwork of the old masters,

My duty in this instance is more than merely official,

And I should be at fault if I modestly declined.”

The Emperor,on hearing this,nodded many times.

And Yu retired and fasted and,in a narrow workroom,

His great brush thick with ink as with drops of rain,

Chose characters like those in the Canons of Yao and Xun,

And a style as in the ancient poems Qingmiao and Shengmin.

And soon the description was ready,on a sheet of paper.

In the morning he laid it,with a bow,on the purple stairs.

He memorialized the throne:“I,unworthy,

Have dared to record this exploit,for a monument.”

The tablet was thirty feet high,the characters large as dippers;

It was set on a sacred tortoise,its columns flanked with ragons…

The phrases were strange with deep words that few could understand;

And jealousy entered and malice and reached the Emperor—

So that a rope a hundred feet long pulled the tablet down

And coarse sand and small stones ground away its face.

But literature endures,like the universal spirit,

And its breath becomes a part of the vitals of all men.

The Tang plate,the Confucian tripod,are eternal things,

Not because of their forms,but because of their inscriptions…

Sagacious is our sovereign and wise his minister,

And high their successes and prosperous their reign;

But unless it be recorded by a writing such as this,

How may they hope to rival the three and five good rulers?

I wish I could write ten thousand copies to read ten thousand times,

Till spittle ran from my lips and calluses hardened my fingers,

And still could hand them down,through seventytwo generations,

As cornerstones for Rooms of Great Deeds on the Sacred Mountains.