From: Seven Military Services Part IV Wang Changling in Tang Dynasty.
There is a dark snow-capped mountain in Qinghai, with long white clouds and a lonely city looking at Yumenguan. Yellow sand wears golden armor in hundreds of battles, but the loulan is not returned.
Translation:
Clouds are gathering over Qinghai Lake, and the continuous snow-capped mountains are bleak. Yumen, the ancient city of frontier fortress, is a majestic pass, separated by thousands of miles, and can only face each other from afar. The soldiers guarding the border have been through many battles and their armor has been worn out. But their ambition never dies, and they will never return to their hometown before defeating the invading enemy.
Wang Changling is good at writing frontier poems. His frontier poems are numerous and of high quality, which can show the life and inner world of the garrison in many aspects, and create a unique and deep style in which heroes and tragic, inspirational and sad blend. ?
The opening of the poem shows a picture of a vast area: above Qinghai Lake, the clouds are long and warm; To the north of the lake, there are snow-capped mountains thousands of miles across the cotton pavilion; Crossing the snow-capped mountains, it is an isolated city, standing in the desert of Hexi Corridor. Further west, it is the Yumen Pass, a military fortress far away from the lonely city.
These two sentences are permeated with rich and complex feelings while writing the scenery: the frontier soldiers' concern for the frontier situation, their pride and sense of responsibility for their tasks, and the loneliness and hardship of frontier life are all integrated in the tragic, open and misty scenery.
Third, the four sentences are changed from the description of the environment with a blend of scenes to direct lyric. The phrase "yellow sand penetrates the golden armor and wins every battle" sums up the long frontier defense, frequent wars, hardships of fighting, tenacity of the enemy and desolation of the frontier with these seven words, highlighting the characteristics of the northwest battlefield and making people imagine the hardships and fierceness of fighting.
"Going home without a day" in the last sentence is a firmer and deeper oath issued after deeply understanding the hardships of the war, and it is also an important ideological feature of excellent frontier poems in the prosperous Tang Dynasty. While expressing the lofty sentiments and ambitions of the soldiers guarding the border, the author did not avoid the hardships of the war, but highly unified the typical environment with the feelings of the characters, reflecting the differences of this poem.