Original text:
Dapeng rises with the wind one day and soars into Wan Li.
If the wind weakens, it can still lift away the turbulent current.
When people see my unchanging tone, they scoff at all my big talk.
Fu Xuan can still fear the afterlife, but her husband can't be young.
Translation:
Dapeng will rise with the wind one day and soar in Wan Li one day.
Even without the help of the wind, the surging water can be swept away by its power.
When the world saw my high-profile, they all sneered and disdained my rhetoric.
However, I remember Confucius said that "the afterlife is terrible".
Fifteen years in Hedong, fifteen years in Hexi, a gentleman should not despise a teenager.
Background:
This poem was written by Li Bai when he was young. Li Yong was the secretariat of Yuzhou (now Chongqing) around the seventh to ninth year of Kaiyuan. When Li Bai visited Chongqing, he paid an audience with Li Yong. Li Yong was unhappy because he was informal and talked about Wang Ba. According to the history books, Li Yong was "quite conceited" (Biography of Li Yong in Old Tang Dynasty). He was conceited and had a good reputation, but he had reservations about being young and backward. Li Bai was dissatisfied with this, and when he left, he wrote this poem "Li Shangyong" in a rather rude manner to show his return.
Appreciate:
By depicting and praising the image of Dapeng, this poem expresses Li Bai's great ambition and strong desire to use the world, and is very dissatisfied with Li Yong's attitude of looking down on young people, showing Li Bai's spirit of being brave in pursuit, confident and conceited, and not afraid of vulgarity. Young Li Bai dared to challenge big shots, and when he first debuted, he was full of the spirit of not being afraid of tigers.