She was never trampled by the Six Armies,
And left as a corpse lying on the yellow sands.
(Takes kerchief, and weeps. Says)
I wonder where you’ve gone now, my empress? All you’ve left behind is this kerchief:1321 it grieves one so!
(Sings)
Who’s gathered up her brocade-bound, joined-narrow-instep
Wu-damask stockings?
Uselessly, I sigh over this tear-specked, beautifully patterned neck-hugging merfolk-silk kerchief.
I painfully pity she can’t have a jade-casket coffin with quicksilver poured,
Nor has any many-coloured-silk-clad palace-supervising beautiful lady,
No “dragging coarse-cloth and trailing hemp”, people in mourning garb,
Nor libating of wine or sprinkling of tea.
I must just temporarily bury you in shallow soil,
And there’s no time either to choose youan imperial “mountain tumulus”,
Or for a tomb to be built.
Yellow dust strews pervading, the wind laments,
The jade-green sky’s faint and pale beneath the declining sun.
Each stage of the road, the waters are verdant clear, the mountains green,
Each step we take through Sword Range and Pa Gorge trudging on.
Indeed, as they say, “the more one sighs moved with emotion,
The more one strews tears sad and forlorn”.
May I quickly die, 1322
Don’t let it be just in this life’s span!
This unable-to-prevail emperor,
Weeping mounts his loose-roaming horse of dapple’s jade-green.
(Exeunt together)
Act Four
(Enter Eunuch-chamberlain Kao)
EUNUCH-CHAMBERLAIN KA: I’m Eunuch-chamberlain Kao. As a boy, I served in the imperial seraglio, and, receiving our monarch’s patronage and promotion, was appointed Superintendent Eunuch1323 of the Six Palaces. In years gone by, our ruler delighted in Lady Yang’s looks, and ordered me to take her into the palace, and he favoured her incomparably with his love, and gave her the title Most-prized-empress, and bestowed upon her the designation Grand-truth.
Later, a rebellious northern barbarian declared war, under the false pretext of wanting to punish and slay Yang Kuo-chung, forced our ruler to favour Shu with a tour. Midway on our journey there, the Six Armies wouldn’t advance any further, and the Dragon-bellicose General of the Right, Ch’en Hsȕan-li, memorialised the throne, accusing Kuo-chung of error, and killed him, his calamitous fate dragging in Most-prized-empress Yang as well. Our ruler was helpless to do anything but do as they told him, and she was garroted in the posting-station of Ma Wei.
Today, the rebels have been quelled, and there’s no trouble. The monarchs returned to the capital, and his Crown Prince has become emperor. My monarch’s in old-age retirement, and has withdrawn to dwell in Western Palace, where night and day all he does is long for Her Majesty Most-prized-empress.
Today, he’s told me to hang up a true portrait of her, to which he weeps and libates morn and night. I must tidy things up properly, and await him here.
(Enter Emperor Dark-progenitor)
EMPEROR DARK-PROGENITO: After I favoured Shu with a tour, and returned to the capital, my Crown Prince defeated the rebellious brigands, and ascended the imperial throne. I’ve withdrawn to dwell in Western Palace, to pass my old age there, and every day I just long for my Empress Yang. I’ve had a painter-artisan make a true-portrait scroll of her, for me to make offerings to, and every day I face it, becoming more and more vexed and upset.
(Sings)
Since I favoured Hsi-ch’uan with a tour, and returned to the capital,
There’ve been just no romantic “moonlit-nights and flower mornings”;
This last half-year, how many more white hairs have I added!
How my sad countenance can I compose!
Thin and feeble,
I’m not spared the mockery of my ministers.
As the picture-scrolls carried high on jade tridents,
The lychees, flowers and fruit perfume the sandalwood tables,
As my eyes look at them, it wounds my bosom-feelings.
(Looks at portrait)
(Sings)
I’m almost blown flat with vexation,
But can’t forbear to go closer,
And burst out aloud, to my Empress Grand-truth calling.
I call, but there’s no response,
And I wail, tears raining.
This court painter1324 really was skilled in technique,
He painted her with no slightest error.
But even though he was a swift colourist and skilled sketcher,
He couldn’t depict her
Whirling-roc Dance by Eaglewood Pavilion.
Her delicate beauty as she mounted her horse before Flower-calyx Tower,
Utterly coquettish and bewitching her.
Oh, my empress,
I always remember how on my birthday,
The banquet in Florescent-purity Palace,
The Seventh Night party Love-luck-begging in Lasting-life Palace-hall,
We vowed to imitate Entwined-branch Love-trees
and Paired-wing Birds.
Who imagined you’d ride a many-coloured phoenix and return to the cinnabar empyrean,
Cut short your living days!
(Says, as part of singing)
The more I look at her, the more I’m grieved. Ah, what on Earth can I do?
(Sings)
I’m minded to build an Empress Yang Temple,
But I don’t have any handle of power, so what can I do!
For I’ve resigned my throne, taken my leave of the court.
But the time allotted me, this “lone North Star”, is hard to bear through,
And what’s more,
Regrets-at-parting Heaven1325 is the highest.
When she was alive, we shared quilt and pillow,
But after death we’re unable also to share inner and outer coffins.
Whoever expected that in the dusty soil of Ma-wei’s Slope,
Alas, a cherry-apple flower would lie in tatters!
(Says, as part of singing)
All of a sudden, my body feels tired and weary. Let me go for a casual stroll to the fore of this pavilion a while. (Sings)
I move my body away from the palace-hall buildings,
Down the high bank at the pavilion-front, let wander at will my steps.
I see the wafting kingfisher-and-blue silks of the willows,
And the split-rouge calyxes of the lotuses.
As I see the lotuses, I long for her bewitching face,
As I encounter the willows, I recall her fiber-fine waist.
As of old, the two things adorn Shang-yang Palace,
While she, I vouch, on the Ch’ang-an Road airily does drift.
I ever recall how we stood beneath the shade of the jade-green parasol-tree,
She in her hand striking the “red-teeth muscles” clappers;
She, smiling, adjusted her thread-gold jacket,
And danced to the Rainbow-skirt music measures.
And now wild weeds fill the inside of the emerald tray,
And beneath the fragrant trees,
melted away are her faint scents.
Uselessly I face the well in the shade of the parasol-tree,
But don’t see the one if city-toppling beautiful-looks.
(Sighs) (Says)
I don’t like pointless strolling, either, so I’d best go back.
(Sings)
I thought originally to casually relax my mind,
To pursue diversion, pleasure find,
But instead it stirs up feelings of old bitter regrets,
Heaven’s barren and Earth’s cold.
Miserably, I return to the quietness of my phoenix bed-curtain,
By what means shall I get through this night’s vexations?
(Says, as part of singing)
On retur
ning to this sleeping-chamber, I find everything boosts one’s sorrows.
(Sings)
The pale full pleasant airs ‘twixt Heaven and Earth are strung through with wafts of incense smoke,
Hazily, dimly, silver lamps shining.
The jade water-clock’s far far,
Just now the first watch reporting.
In the faint light, I look at the blue empyrean,
For her to come in some dream I’m longing.
But don’t they say that “the mouth’s the sprout of the heart”?
So I’m frequently non-stop to her calling.
(Says, as part of singing.)
Suddenly I feel a wave of blur come over me - let me try to sleep a little.
(Sings)
This moment, my heart’s sore and impatient,
On all sides, autumn insects noise.
Suddenly, I see west wind’s bane lifting the door-curtain,
And distantly perceive all the ground covered with dark clouds.
I wrap my clothes round me and disconsolate lean by the bed-screens,
Cursed-karma eyes impossible to close.
Why, it’s actually some withered leaves floating rustle-rustling
round the unvisited steps,
And swooshing-sweeping, the fallen leaves
are brushed along by the west wind,
And whoo-whooing, the wind flickers spluttering the silver lamps.
Tinkle-rattling call the hailstones,
Rustle-swishing stir the vermilion portieres,
And jingle-jangling the jade-horse chimes clamour in the eaves.
(Goes to sleep. Sings)
Forlornly despondently, I draw my coat robe together, lie down,
And limply feebly flopping, have only just gone to sleep and rest.
(Enter Empress Yang’s spirit.)
EMPRES YANG’S SPIRIT: I’m Empress Yang. Today I’m holding a feast in the palace-hall. Palace ladies, invite our monarch to take his place at the feast.
EMPEROR DARK-PROGENITOR:
(Sings)
Suddenly I see Green Robe servant-maids coming towards me to announce,
Saying Empress Grand-truth invites me to entertainments and a feast.
(Emperor meets Empress Yang)
EMPEROR DARK-PROGENITOR: My empress, where have you come from?
EMPRESS YANG’S SPIRIT: Today I’m holding a feast in Lasting-life Palace-hall. I invite you my monarch please to come to my party.
EMPEROR DARK-PROGENITOR: Instruct the Young Gentlemen of the Pear Orchard Conservatoire to prepare everything in order.
(Exit Empress Yang’s spirit.)
EMPEROR DARK-PROGENITOR: (Waking up with a start) Oh, so it was a dream, after all! I clearly saw Empress Yang in my dreams, but now she’s disappeared again.
(Sings)
She dipped her “kingfisher-roc tail-feather” hair-ornament,1326
Wholly like her old fair figure when she came forth from bathing,
Revealing half her delicate beauty from a cloud-decorated screen.
When a lovely dream was about to be fulfilled,
I was instead startled awake,
And with half my breast-flapful of loving-tears,
I wet my dragon-silk gown.
In vexation and chagrin, I darkly ponder,
Nor was it “the wild-geese passing over the tower” that startled me awaking,
Nor the winter-crickets at the foot of stone steps,
Nor the jade-horse chimes to the fore of the eaves,
Nor the golden cockerel on its perch perching.
Why, it was yonder rain swish-swishing on the parasol-tree outside my window,
Sound after sound on the faded leaves sprinkling,
Dripping drip on drip on the wintry tree-top branches,
Fit to injure a person sorrowing.
This rain,
Isn’t saving young corn from drought.
Nor moistening withered plants,
Nor sprinkling-open flower-calyces.
Who’d have expected that the autumn rain would be like unguent,
On the kingfisher-green twigs,
And jade-green branch-tips,
With smithereens of sound pip-popping,
Hundreds of times an increase on its cadences on the banana trees.
It just keeps on scattering a-drift its thousand pearls and jade,
Gratuitously “spilled-vat and overturned-bowl” falling all night,
Stirring up one’s heart’s donor.
Now it’s urgent,
Like myriad pearls tumbling into a jade bowl released.
Now it’s noisy,
Like the noise of a few clusters of mouth-harmoniums at some “tortoise-shell” splendid feast.
Now it’s clear-sounding,
Like a cold stream cascading from kingfisher cliffs.
Now it’s fierce,
Like several war-drum’s rattles beneath embroidered flags.
Ah, but it distresses me to death, alay-alay,
Ah, but it distresses me to death, alay-alay,
I’m just deafened by all those various kinds of rain-cacophonies.
This rain in gust after gust strikes the parasol-tree’s leaves to fall,
Drop after drop drips one’s hearts to bits torn.
It’s pointless its close-circling “gold” well’s silver platform,
All one can do is burn the wretched branches and leaves as firewood,
And saw the tree down.
(Says, as part of singing)
In the old days, when my empress danced in the emerald tray, it was beneath this tree. When I and my empress made our vows of love, it was also facing this tree. And now that I seek her in my dreams, it’s this tree again that startles me awake.
(Sings)
That night when, in Lasting-life Palace-hall,
We turned along the winding covered walkways,
And our vows of love we declared,
We shouldn’t have leaned shoulder to shoulder facing the parasol-tree,
Talking on and on, saying all to be said.
That morning, when at Eaglewood Pavilion,
She performed Rainbow-skirt and danced Six-ones,
“Red-teeth-chopstick” clappers striking the tune,
Wild notes clamouring their noise.
It was oh the joyous trysts of those times, that cultivated, prepared the way
For today’s bleak desolations, come together like spokes to a hub,
As I darkly muse.
EUNUCH-CHAMBERLAIN KAO: My monarch, all these various kinds of plants and tree bear the sound of rain - it’s certainly not just the parasol-tree alone, is it!
EMPEROR DARK-PROGENITOR: You just don’t realise! Let me tell you.
(Sings)
Damply continuously fine-drizzling the rain on the willows,
Bleakly forlornly from the courtyard invades my door-curtains.
Fine-silk-silkily, rain on the plums,
Adorns all the river-side bowers and pavilions.
Apricot-blossom rain redly damps the balustrades,
Pear-blossom rain’s white-jade countenance is lonely, forlorn appears,
Lotus-flower rain’s kingfisher-hue canopies dancing and twirling,
Sweet-pea rain desolate on dark-green leaves forlorn.
But none of these is like you, parasol-tree, for startling one from a dream,
Augmenting bitter regrets, and increasing sorrows,
Through the night, all night long.
Surely, it’s water-nymphs plying their coquetries,
Soaking the willows, floating a-sprinkle in the winds.
Gush-gushing, like the propitious beast of a fountain over paired pools,
Swish-swishing like spring silkworms munching leaves,
And strewing them all over their silkworm-baskets.
Haphazardly, it scatters on the white- jade steps,
Its water running the imperial-palace water-clocks,
Flying up
to ornamented eaves,
Wine dripping into the new gutters.
It comes down till the watch is nigh done, the clepsydra cut off,1327
My pillow cold and my quilt chilly,
My incense dissipated, and extinguished my candles.
It’s well known how in summer to his unawares,
It floated away Kao Feng’s wheat-grains.1328
Going with the west wind, it softly whistles at my gauze-silk casements,
Delivering wintry air, frequently knocking at my embroidered doors:
Surely it’s Heaven deliberately stirring up one’s sorrows and miseries!
I feel its sounds of little bells ringing along the strutted walkways,
Are like Flower-slave’s Chieh Drum tunes,
Like Po-ya’s “Water-nymph” dulcimer-melodies.
It washes the chrysanthemums, and dampens the fences,
It drenches the verdant mosses, and tumbles wall-corners,
It chiaroscuros the ornamental Lake Rocks, and rinses their stone holes,
It steeps withered leaves,
It brims-over ponds and pools.
Moistening last butterflies, so their powder-hue steadily fades,
Sprinkling drifting fireflies, so they can’t ignite their lights.
Before my green window, it urges-on the “weaving-urger” cricket calls,
As its sounds approach, high go the wild-geese forms,
It hastens the neighbourhood’s washboards’ pounding,1329
And earlier than normal the new coolness augments.
Weighing things up, this whole night
the rain tight-and-dogged company me keeps,
It’s companion to all the bronze-pot clepsydra’s tap-taps,
And as the rain increases, undiminished are my tears.
The rain wets the cold branch-tips,
My tears stain my dragon robes.
It refuses to spare me,
But, just a parasol-tree away, drips right through till dawn breaks.
(Exuent)
Appendices and Endnotes Page 10