This is the poem "Linjiang Immortal·Denghou Tower High Lock" by Yan Jidao, a poet of the Northern Song Dynasty. Among them, the sentence "The falling flower is independent, and the light and swift swallows fly together" is the most praised by future generations. Tan Xian, a poet critic of the Qing Dynasty, commented in "Tan Ping·Ci Bian": "The two lines of 'falling flowers' are famous throughout the ages, and there cannot be two." However, this famous line of "there cannot be two" comes from the poets of the Five Dynasties. It was adapted from Weng Hong's poems.
Weng Hong, also known as Daju, whose date of birth and death is unknown, was born in Guiling Town, Hezhou. The editor of "Complete Poems of the Tang Dynasty" mistakenly regarded him as a native of Guizhou (now Guilin) ??in his notes. "He County Chronicle" records that Weng Hong "lived between Zhao and He". Zhao is Zhaozhou, which is today's Pingle; He is Hezhou, which is today's Hezhou City. Weng Hong often traveled between Zhaozhou and Hezhou, so he often sang with Wang Yuan, a poet from Guizhou, and responded to each other with Lin Chucai, a poet from Fuchuan in Hezhou. When the poet Liao Rong, who lived in seclusion in Hengshan, traveled south, he even consulted Liao Rong with his poems. According to the "He County Chronicles", Weng Hong was "calm in nature, unwilling to advance in officialdom, and expressed his aspirations and chants", which shows that he had no intention of advancing in officialdom and was content with a quiet and leisurely life.
Weng Hong mainly lived during the Five Dynasties period. During this period, the north and the south were divided, various political factions fought for power, wars were frequent, and the people were in dire straits. Faced with such a social environment, Weng Hong had no intention of pursuing an official career and instead entertained himself by focusing on the mountains, rivers, flowers and moon. For the same reason, a group of poets who did not serve as officials appeared in the late Tang and Five Dynasties. They live a solitary life and only move in a very small circle. Weng Hong interacted mostly with reclusive poets such as Liao Rong, Ren Hu, Wang Zhengji, Yang Huizhi, Zhang Guan, Wang Yuan, and Lu Chan. They compete with each other, study together, stay away from the mainstream society, and wander among the mountains, forests and valleys. Generally speaking, their works cannot profoundly reflect the social conditions at that time, but their poems pay attention to the contrast between language and rhythm, and strive to reflect a fresh poetic flavor. This deliberate pursuit in art is still important to the development of Chinese poetry. It has a certain meaning.
How many poems did Weng Hong write? According to "He County Chronicles", during the Kaibao period of the Song Dynasty (968-975), Liao Rong, a scholar in Hengshan, traveled south, and Weng Hong showed him one hundred poems he had written. It can be seen that he wrote a lot of poems. However, because Weng Hong lived in troubled times and had a low social status, only a few of his works have been handed down: "The Complete Poems of the Tang Dynasty" contains three poems including "Spring Can" and a triptych of fragments; "Continued and Addendum" has been compiled into six couplets of fragments. This is all of Weng Hong's works that can be seen today.
On Weng Hong’s achievements in poetry, Liao Rong’s poem “Xie Wenghong’s Reflections on Hundreds of Poems” made an evaluation:
A hundred poems of Gao Qi reveal the work of fortune. Complete.
Thinking about traveling across the sea and searching into the cave.
The divine beads are lost in confusion, and the jade is carved by bandits.
Don’t lament that you are unable to do anything, Li Sao will be passed down through the ages.
Liao Rong spoke highly of Weng Hong. Liao Rong believes that Weng Hong's poems are rich in imagination, and the language has no trace of carving. It is integrated, complete and very natural. Liao Rong praised Weng Hong's work as being comparable to "Li Sao" and can be recited through the ages, which seems to be an excessive praise.
Only the three poems and couplets handed down to the disabled are not enough for us to make a comprehensive evaluation of Weng Hong’s artistic achievements in poetry, but these limited works can also reflect some of the social psychology of the time: I hope society is stable and beautiful. In the poem "Autumn Remnant", "I still hear that the Han Dynasty protects the country, and this year we will have peace", which reflects the poet's hope that the war will end and peace will be restored. In the poem "Send Off Liao Rong as a Scholar to the South", the line "The latent ambition has been exhausted, but the pure wind has not yet returned" expresses the author's yearning for a better society. But Weng Hong's poems are more about expressing his reclusive thoughts and feelings. From an artistic point of view, some of Weng Hong's poems are more ambitious, such as "The wind is high and the power of the bow is strong, and the sound of the horns is withered under the heavy frost" (sentence from "Song Xia Qu"), "The land of the cold Qing Dynasty is cold and the four-dimensional roots are soaked" "("Mid-Autumn Moon" sentence). Generally speaking, his poems are delicate and delicate, mostly exaggerating the feeling of twilight and the beauty of decay. "Spring Remnant" is the most representative:
It is Spring Remnant again, how to produce green curtains.
The fallen flower man is independent, and the little swift bird flies together.
The soul in the eyes is about to die, nor is the dream about the body.
It is worth looking forward to the sorrowful evening, and the cicadas are glowing at dusk.
This poem is also called "Gong Ci", so some people think it was written for the palace maids, while others think it is a caring poem for an ordinary woman. Putting aside these arguments, we can reconstruct a sad story: In late spring, a woman was locked in a boudoir, depressed and unhappy, thinking about things, but she did not dare to step out of the "green curtain". The beloved has not returned from a long journey, and when she walks out of the "green curtain", she stands alone in front of the flowers, watching the fallen flowers falling, with a myriad of thoughts; in the drizzle, swallows fly around in pairs, even more charming. It evoked her sadness. Although these soul-destroying scenes increased the woman's longing, the dream that haunted her for a whole year diluted the beauty's figure in the dream. The sunset, the afterglow, the chirping of cicadas, and the rustling dusk make people feel sad and sad. This sad scene in late spring constitutes a distinct artistic conception. In particular, the two sentences "The falling flower is independent, and the swift swallows fly together" contrast the "independent" people with the "two-flying" swallows, setting off the image of the protagonist alone, and depicting the protagonist's inner sorrow and sadness. In this poem, the author changes "scenery language" into "love language", depicting the beauty and sentimental mood of Xiao Sa in late spring, leaving a deep impression on the readers.
Throughout the past dynasties, countless people have annotated "Spring Cannot", but everyone only paid attention to the artistic conception of the poem, and there was no reasonable explanation for the phenomenon of "Xiao Sa Du Mu Cicada Hui". Are there cicadas chirping in late spring? Sima Guang's "He Jingren Heard the Cicadas" contains the sentence "The spring forest is full of green rocks, who would believe that the cicadas are already singing". In March this year, some netizens heard cicadas chirping in Nanshan, Chongqing and took photos. It seems that it is possible to hear the chirping of cicadas in spring, especially late spring. There are two theories for the reason. One theory is that there is a kind of cicada called "Spring Cicada", and when it chirps, it shouts "Wake up - wake up". Another theory is that if the temperature in spring is abnormal and exceeds 24 degrees Celsius, summer cicadas will emerge and sing in advance. Weng Hong uses the chirping of cicadas in late spring to set off the protagonist's melancholy, which is one step higher than others.
Weng Hong is not a famous poet, but his poem "The falling flower is independent, and the swift swallows fly together" is a rare and famous line through the ages. It has been included in popular books such as "Three Hundred Tang Poems" by modern people. These two poems. I believe that the poem "there cannot be two" left by Weng Hong will be passed down for a long time.