Lipper
Dance of White Swan
White hair three thousands of feet,
yun chóu sègáng
Fate is like a long sorrow.
Desperate.
I don't know. In the mirror,
Haichang county
Where is the autumn frost?
Extended data:
Creation background
This poem was written in the last years of Tianbao in Li Longji, Xuanzong of Tang Dynasty. At that time, the Tang Dynasty was politically corrupt and the poet was deeply worried about the whole situation. At this time, Li Bai was over 50 years old, and his ideal could not be realized, but he was suppressed and excluded. Why not let the poet worry about his white hair and dye his temples with autumn cream?
works appreciation
Full text appreciation: This poem expresses the poet's talent with romantic exaggeration.
The first sentence "three thousands of feet with white hair" is a wonderful exaggeration, which seems unreasonable. A person can't have seven feet tall and three thousand feet long hair.
I didn't understand until I read the next sentence, "Fate is like a long sorrow", because sorrow is like this. "Fate", because; "Long", so long. White hair is born of sadness and grows because of sadness. This 3000-foot white hair is a symbol of inner sadness. The tangible white hair in the poem is replaced by the intangible sadness, so these three thousands of feet's white hairs are naturally understood as artistic exaggeration.
The last two sentences "I don't know where to get the autumn frost in the mirror" mean: I look in the clear bronze mirror and see my rustling white hair, and I don't know how my hair became so white. By asking myself questions, I further strengthened the characterization of the word "sorrow" and expressed the poet's difficult dilemma. "Autumn frost" refers to white hair, which has a sad and haggard emotional color.
References:
Baidu Encyclopedia-White Hair (Poem by Li Bai)