The Poetics of Sovereignty
Page 64
The mention of the dark cranes’ arrival signifies a larger claim that
Taizong has successfully cultivated his virtue and is able to bear listening
to music of sagely potency. Here, there is an allusion to an anecdote con-
cerning Ziye 子野, also known as Music-master Kuang 師曠 of the state
of Jin during the Warring States period, which is told in different forms
in texts from the early period. An extensive version of the story is related
in the Han Feizi, which recounts how, at a feast that Duke Ping of Jin 晉
平公 (r. 557–532 bc) holds for Duke Ling of Wei 衛靈公 (r. 534–493 bc),
Music-master Juan 師涓 of Wei performs a mysterious tune that he had
heard while camped at the Pu River. Kuang immediately interrupts Juan,
saying, “This is the sound of a lost state; you cannot proceed” 此亡國之
聲，不可遂也. As it turns out, the song was one originally composed by
the ancient Music-master Yan 延 for Zhou, the last ruler of the Shang
dynasty. After the Shang overthrow in 1045 bc, Yan drowned himself at
the Pu River—exactly where Duke Ling had overheard the ghostly song.
Despite Kuang’s warning, Duke Ping insists that the song be per-
formed. When it is finished, he asks Kuang whether its mode could be
called the saddest ( zuibei 最悲). Kuang replies that the pure shang mode ( qingshang 清商) cannot compare to the pure zhi mode ( qingzhi 清徵), and also that the duke’s “virtue is thin and not adequate to listen to it” 德
薄不足以聽. Again, the duke insists on hearing the pure zhi, and as
Kuang plays the piece, “two groups of eight black cranes from the south-
ern lands arrive” 二八道南方來, singing and dancing along with the mu-
sic. The duke then asks whether there is a mode even sadder than the pure
zhi; Kuang replies that the pure jue ( qingjue 清角) is even sadder. When Duke Ping insists on hearing a song in this mode, Kuang argues that the
music of the pure jue was created by the Yellow Thearch himself, with
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On “The Imperial Capital Poems”
365
other great deities and spirits in concert, and warns the duke that there
will be grave consequences. Of course, once more, the duke prevails, and
when the song is played, a fierce storm arises, terrifying the duke and all
present. Kuang’s warning turns out to be correct: a drought strikes Jin,
drying out the earth for three years, and the duke falls ill with some sort of
“disease of infirmity” 癃病.
In contrast to Duke Ping, Taizong represents himself as having the
right to hear such music. Moreover, by then calling for the banishment of
the music of Zheng and Wei, the emperor shows that he remains in con-
trol of his feelings and moral compass, even when enjoying songs of ex-
treme feeling. Yet his call to banish Zheng and Wei from the music quar-
ters means that they are, or were once, present. Reinforcing this
worrisome possibility is the last line: “It is elegant tones that I now can en-
joy.” Taizong’s use of the temporal marker “now” ( fang 方) indicates a
conversion from one state to another; prior to hearing “White Snow,”
Taizong may have enjoyed other kinds of music—perhaps the very ones
that he is banishing. The sentiment Taizong wishes to express is one that
arises from the claims of askēsis, from the renunciation of indulgence in
pleasure and the elevation of ritually proper music.
The problem of imperial pleasure and desire becomes more pro-
nounced as Taizong continues away from the palace buildings, entering
into the park. As we have already noticed, the park is both the locus of
imperial power (the microcosm of the world) and of imperial extrava-
gance. For this reason, it was the perfect subject for Sima Xiangru, whose
rhapsody on the emperor’s hunting park catalogued and praised the al-
most infinite variety of Han Wudi’s possessions. As we have seen, Tai-
zong possessed a consciousness of this rhapsody and its moral complexi-
ties, and yet he was also drawn to it as an exemplary imperial literary genre.
In the poem that follows, certain rhapsodic themes are raised, and an at-
tempt is made to resolve the problems associated with that genre.
Poem Five
On a fragrant morning, I pursue unhurried interests, 芳辰追逸趣，
The forbidden park truly has many wonders.
禁苑信多奇。
The bridge’s form enters into the Milky Way above, 橋形通漢上，
The peaks’ contours reach the clouds perched high. 峰勢接雲危。
Vapors and rosy mist alternately hide and glow,
煙霞交隱映，
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366
On “The Imperial Capital Poems”
Flowers and birds naturally appear in contrast.
花鳥自參差。
But why indulge in traces of chariot ruts,
何如肆轍跡，
And go ten thousand miles to enjoy the Jasper Pool? 萬里賞瑤池。
This poem follows the topic of spring introduced by “fragrant season” in
the previous poem. Taizong sets the note of the piece by saying that he is
pursuing “unhurried interests,” which suggests a kind of carefree idleness.
The sense of non-activity that Taizong had earlier imbued with moral jus-
tifications, whether through the examination of canonical texts or the
embrace of wuwei in sagely rulership, is now mere leisure, a roaming ( you) through the residence grounds without a particular end.
The problem of pure leisure is made more apparent once Taizong en-
ters into the park, the literary territory of the Han rhapsody. As with the
first poem, the emperor is enraptured by the transcendental appearance of
the imperial grounds; he describes the way in which the park bridge tow-
ers above the scene, bending outward above a terrestrial river and inwards
into its celestial counterpart. As Taizong’s eyes are drawn up by the bridge,
his gaze is caught by other things high above him, such as the mountain
peaks and clouds, and the birds in the flowering trees. The usual poetic
propriety is to balance high and low objects of the poet’s gaze, to move
from heaven to earth, mountain to waters; it is conspicuous that Taizong
does not do this here, keeping his gaze aloft. This is perhaps an accident of
a mediocre poet who is not in full control of elegant literary description,
but it also keeps nicely with the preceding poems, in which the local space
of the imperial capital becomes infused with the transcendent, with celes-
tial imagery and auspicious omens.
Still, the poem has not yet resolved the undeniable pleasures of spring-
time roaming and the consciousness that the sovereign should not go too
far. Taizong’s closing comment, which alludes to King Mu of Zhou, at-
tempts to do just that. Taizong had earlier discussed the Jasper Pool of the
Queen Mother of the West in the preface. There, however, he had bal-
anced the apophatic rejection of divine sexual congress with a meditation
on the great Zhou founders Wen and Wu. In this poem, the original rhe-
torical balance and antithesis is missing, leaving only the balance between
his negation of immortal fantasies and the idle pleasures of springtime
roaming in the park space. This is a rather less high-minded antithesis
that raises the possibility that Taizong has been seduced by the mirage of
his own poetic language. He is not reenacting King Mu at the feast of the
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On “The Imperial Capital Poems”
367
Queen Mother of the West, but neither can he be said to be emulating
the Duke of Zhou.
This is a problem of poetic representation, which has a tendency to
roam as well. Though the panegyric to the capital may have begun as Tai-
zong’s attempt to represent his own virtue and to declare his personal fru-
gality in the context of bad rulers of the past, the poetic mode invites him
to inscribe ornament and sensuous pleasures upon the very scenes that
should avoid such displays. It may be true that he will not leave the seat of
his public duties for the pursuit of fanciful desires, but he unwittingly cre-
ates within the public space a site of private bodily desires. The rhetorical
question, “But why should I indulge in traces of wheel ruts / And go ten
thousand miles to enjoy Jasper Pool?” folds in upon itself. One indeed
does not need to follow King Mu’s chariot tracks if Jasper Pool is already
within the imperial capital.
The danger of poetic seduction continues in the next poem, which
takes Taizong from the park to a boating scene upon one of the artificial
lakes in the imperial grounds:
Poem Six
The flying canopy leaves the fragrant park,
飛蓋去芳園，
The thoroughwort skiff glides past the azure islets.
蘭撓遊翠渚。
Among the duckweed, the sun’s colors run riot,
萍間日彩亂，
Amid lotuses, the fragrant wind rises.
荷處香風舉。
Cinnamon oars fill the stream halfway,
桂楫滿川中，
Stringed songs rouse the far-off islands.
弦歌振長嶼。
Why sing the song of the Fen River?
豈必汾河曲，108
Just here is a place to enjoy a feast.
方為歡宴所。
Taizong moves from one springtime outing scene to another, from the
fragrance of the flowering trees to the fragrance of the flowers of the lake.
The style of the poem also undergoes a significant change, emerging from
the fu-related problems of transcendent representation and entering into
the lush imagery of the Southland as figured in the palace-style tradition.
—————
108. “The song of the Fen River” is a reference to Han Wudi’s “Song of the Autumn
Wind” 秋風辭, which Wudi supposedly composed while crossing the Fen River to “sacri-
fice to Great Earth” 祠后土. This is mentioned in the preface to the lyrics; see Wen xuan, 45.2025–26.
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368
On “The Imperial Capital Poems”
It is with the second line, “The thoroughwort skiff glides past the azure
islets,” that we are brought into Xiao Gang’s world of leisure. A represen-
tative poem by the Liang prince is his “Jiangnan Longings” 江南思,
which reads:
Cinnamon oars at evening should turn back,
桂楫晚應旋，
Passing the banks, we tap the light gunnels.
歷岸扣輕舷。
On purple lotuses is served the caught carp,
紫荷擎釣鯉，
Silver baskets are stuck with short-stem lilies.
銀筐插短蓮。
People are returning as the inlet grows dark,
人歸浦口暗，
How can we delay turning back the boat?
那得久回船。109
This is an intricate work that describes the hazy delights of princely leisure,
which is another form of you, or “roaming.” Xiao Gang’s poem begins with
a synecdochal reduction of the boat to its “cinnamon oars,” which ought to
return to shore as the evening descends. The occupants of the boat, how-
ever, are too involved in singing and merrymaking, tapping the sides of the
boat in time to the music, to notice how late the hour is. Indeed, the poem
may be said to thematize the luxury of wasting time, since nothing happens
beyond singing, fishing, and lotus gathering. The final question, “How can
we delay turning back the boat?” is an ambiguous one, pointing both to the
expectation of return at dusk, and the desire to prolong the pleasure—
“How can we delay turning back the boat?” And to end with such a ques-
tion allows the moment to be suspended in time, since nothing is resolved
or completed; all is held in the ironic non-closure of the poet’s double-
meaning.
The world of leisure that Xiao Gang’s poem constructs cannot be emu-
lated by Taizong if he wants to maintain the argument that the sovereign’s
leisure is not true leisure at all. Yet all the components of Xiao’s world are
reproduced in Taizong’s poem, from the images of the thoroughwort boat
and cinnamon oars amid the duckweed and lotuses to the fragrant wind
and the wanton diffusion of the sun’s colors in the water. Taizong’s poem
also seems to borrow from the imagery of another of Xiao Gang’s poems:
—————
109. Yuefu shiji, 26.385; and Xian Qin Han Wei Jin Nanbeichao shi, p. 1912. This poem has also been translated in Marney, Beyond the Mulberries, p. 45.
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On “The Imperial Capital Poems”
369
“Song of Picking Lotuses” 採蓮曲
Cinnamon oars and thoroughwort skiff float on
桂楫蘭橈浮碧水，
emerald
waters,
River flowers and jade faces resemble one another.
江花玉面兩相似。
The lotus spreads, its roots snap, a fragrant
蓮疏藕折香風起，
wind
arises,
A fragrant wind arises,
香風起，
The white sun descends,
白日低，
A song of picking lotuses,
採蓮曲，
Will cause you to go astray.
使君迷.110
In his own poem, Taizong cannot, or will not, re-perform Xiao Gang’s
concluding lines, but instead attempts to recapture the moral flavor of his
preface by asking, “Why sing the song of the Fen River? / Just here is a
place to enjoy a feast.” This is again the argument for the domestic enjoy-
ments of the capital, as opposed to indulging in tours and journeys out-
side of Chang’an. Taizong draws a contrast between himself and Han
Wudi, who is said to have composed the “Song of the Autumn Wind”
while crossing the Fen River. Furthermore, as Wudi was on his way to sa-
crifice to the de
ity of “Great Earth” (Houtu 后土), the terrestrial coun-
ter-ritual to the celestial Feng and Shan rites, Taizong is making an indi-
rect criticism of Wudi’s arrogance and extravagance. In this closing
couplet, Taizong attempts to counter the force of the Jiangnan imagery by
reminding the reader (or the poet himself ) of his moral restraint, of the
fact that he is engaging only pleasures on a small scale, in miniature. Again,
the particle fang (“now, here”) takes on a particular importance, since it
both dismisses Han Wudi’s enjoyment of faraway roaming and ritual hu-
bris, and it reminds us that Taizong is playing at Jiangnan here—in the
imperial capital and not in Jiangnan.
At this point, the day is now drawing towards evening, and Taizong
turns from the lake, heading back towards the residence. However, we
shall see in the seventh poem that the problem of roaming in the South-
land follows the emperor, even though he never leaves the palace grounds.
—————
110. See Yuefu shiji, 50.729; and Lu Qinli, Xian Qin Han Wei Jin Nanbeichao shi, p. 1925.
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370
On “The Imperial Capital Poems”
Poem Seven
The setting sun darkens the twin watchtowers,
落日雙闕昏，
I turn the carriage back at dusk to the nine-layer
回輿九重暮。
palace.
Trailing mist dissolves in the emerging Jade River,
長煙散初碧，111
The bright moon washes pure with weightless white. 皎月澄輕素。112
Pulling up the screen we toy with zither and books, 搴幌玩琴書，
Opening the windows we invite in clouds and fog.
開軒引雲霧。
The silver Han shines on the layered pavilion,
銀漢耿層閣，
A clear wind shakes the jade trees.
清風搖玉樹。113
When Taizong turns back to the palace, he stops at a moon-viewing pavil-