Lantern FestivalPoetry

Xin Qiji (1140–1207), courtesy name You’an and literary name Jiaxuan, was one of the greatest ci poets of the Southern Song. Throughout his life he strongly advocated resistance against the Jin, yet his ambitions remained unrealized, and he withdrew from public life in his later years. The Green Jade Table · Lantern Festival is one of his representative works and has been praised as the “finest Lantern Festival lyric through the ages.” Among all classical poems and lyrics on the Lantern Festival, this work is often regarded as unsurpassed. The renowned scholar Zhou Ruchang praised it highly: “写上元灯节的词，不计其数，稼轩的这一首，却谁也不能视为可有可无，即此亦可谓豪杰了。”

The exact date of composition cannot be established. It is generally believed to have been written after Xin Qiji crossed south. The Southern Song’s reduced territory stood in painful contrast to the prosperity of the Northern Song, and amid the bustle of the Lantern Festival the poet felt not only festive joy, but also profound longing for the lost homeland and reflections on his own life. Liang Qichao described the lyric as “自怜幽独，伤心人别有怀抱,” understanding it as a work of deeper personal and political implication.

Upper Stanza — Unfolding the Splendor of the Lantern Festival

The opening three lines, “东风夜放花千树，更吹落、星如雨,” use a vigorous brush to paint the lights of the Lantern Festival. The chill spring wind seems, in a single night, to force open dazzling lanterns and fireworks; amid shifting light and shadow, fireworks burst as though stars were falling from the heavens in a shower. The passage echoes the imaginative world of Cen Shen’s “忽如一夜春风来，千树万树梨花开.” “花千树” refers to countless lanterns blooming like flowers upon a thousand trees, while “星如雨” describes fireworks filling the sky. Meng Man once praised this in The Chinese Poetry Competition as the most beautiful line ever written about Lantern Festival lights.

“宝马雕车香满路” — Fine horses and carved carriages emphasize the luxury of the vehicles, while fragrance filling the road suggests both the density of the crowds and the richness of perfume. The lyric now shifts its gaze toward the lantern market, where the entire city seems to have emptied into the streets.

“凤箫声动，玉壶光转，一夜鱼龙舞” — “凤箫” is an elegant name for the panpipe, while “玉壶” refers to the moon. Music, turning moonlight, and dancing fish-and-dragon lanterns interweave. Carriages, instruments, fireworks, lanterns, and moonlight combine into a richly colored scroll of festival viewing. The phrase “一夜” conveys the duration of the revelry: it continues through the entire night, without weariness.

Lower Stanza — The Deep Feeling of Searching Through the Crowd

“蛾儿雪柳黄金缕，笑语盈盈暗香去” — “蛾儿,” “雪柳,” and “黄金缕” all refer to ornaments worn in women’s hair. With delicate strokes, the poet sketches a scene filled with women out enjoying the festival. “笑语” conveys their happiness and delight, “盈盈” suggests graceful and light movement, while “暗香” refers both to feminine fragrance and the scent that lingers as they pass. In only a few words, their glances and flowing movement are rendered with remarkable vividness.

“众里寻他千百度，蓦然回首，那人却在，灯火阑珊处” — This is the lyric’s finishing stroke. After richly unfolding the magnificence of the Lantern Festival, the poet suddenly turns, revealing why he has been wandering and searching through the lantern market. He has not lingered because he is intoxicated by festive splendor or drifting fragrance; he has been seeking, again and again, the unforgettable “那人” in his heart. Where is she? When he suddenly turns his head, he discovers with astonished joy that she is standing where the lanterns are fading and nearly gone. In Renjian Cihua (《人间词话》), Wang Guowei placed “众里寻他千百度，蓦然回首，那人却在，灯火阑珊处” in the third of the three realms that “古今之成大事业、大学问者” must pass through. The lyric’s exceptional artistry lies chiefly in three dimensions.

First, it writes a refined and graceful lyric with a vigorous hand. Its tone is clear, pure, subtle, and enduring, greatly enriching the aesthetic range of ci. Second, it uses the language of prosperity to write inward grief. The dazzling noise of the outer world throws the pain and desolation within into sharper relief. Its superb depiction of the Lantern Festival is, in a sense, a screen: beneath it lies nothing other than “自怜幽独，伤心人别有怀抱.” Third, against a background of revelry, it creates the most profound solitude. The figure sought is not where the lights burn brightest, but where they are growing dim. This is not merely a physical position; it is an attitude toward life. From the brilliance of “东风夜放花千树” at the beginning to the cool quiet of “灯火阑珊处” at the end, the lyric completes an emotional arc from noise to stillness. The revelry belongs to others; the quiet belongs to oneself.

Shengchazi · Lantern Festival is one of the most graceful and moving works in the entire corpus of Lantern Festival poetry. Its authorship has long been debated. Traditionally attributed to Ouyang Xiu, it has also been ascribed by some scholars to the Southern Song woman poet Zhu Shuzhen. Qing scholar Wang Shizhen noted in Chibei Outan (《池北偶谈》) that the lyric appears in The Collected Works of Ouyang Wenzhonggong (《欧阳文忠公集》). Whoever its author may be, the work uses language of extraordinary simplicity to express profound sorrow over the transformation of human circumstances while the world itself remains unchanged.

The lyric was written in the third year of the Jingyou era, 1036, when Ouyang Xiu was mourning his second wife, Lady Yang. The upper stanza recalls the Lantern Festival of the previous year; the lower stanza expresses the pain of longing during the festival in the present year.

The artistic conception of the lyric resembles Cui Hu’s Tang poem Written at a Village South of the Capital (《题都城南庄》): “人面不知何处去，桃花依旧笑春风.” Yet the language of Ouyang Xiu—or Zhu Shuzhen—possesses an even more circling and interwoven beauty, with a stronger flavor of folk song.

The upper stanza recalls the happy meeting of the previous Lantern Festival. “花市灯如昼” fully evokes the festival’s dazzling brilliance. The lower stanza returns to the same place a year later and expresses grief at the beloved’s absence. The author does not directly describe the anticipation before the meeting, their laughter after they met, or the turmoil of parting. A single line—“人约黄昏后”—is enough to suggest it all, displaying profound artistic restraint.

The lyric’s greatest power lies in the tension between what does not change and what does. The moon and lanterns remain “依旧,” suggesting that before nature, time appears almost still; yet “不见去年人” reveals the instability of human affairs. Countless Lantern Festival poems describe bustling markets or crowds at play. This lyric takes another path entirely, using the monologue of a woman—or perhaps a man—to write with delicate intimacy about love during the festival. It brings the Lantern Festival back from a collective revelry to individual joy and sorrow, allowing lantern light and moonlight to become the setting and witness of a love story.

Li Qingzhao (1084–c. 1155), literary name Yi’an Jushi, was the most distinguished woman ci poet of the Southern Song. She wrote this lyric late in life while living as a refugee in Lin’an, present-day Hangzhou. After the Jingkang catastrophe and the fall of the Northern Song, Li Qingzhao endured the loss of her country, her home, and her husband, followed by repeated hardship after fleeing south. Encountering the Lantern Festival again only deepened her sorrow and anxiety, prompting this celebrated lyric. Although the poem is set during Yuanxiao, it overturns conventional festive expectations. By contrasting Lantern Festivals of past and present, it expresses profound awareness of rise and decline, together with grief over the course of her own life.

Upper Stanza — Present Scenery and a Desolate State of Mind

The opening three lines, “落日熔金，暮云合璧，人在何处” — The setting sun is like molten gold; evening clouds gather like joined discs of jade. The parallelism is elegant and the language brilliant. Yet immediately afterward comes “人在何处,” breaking away into a long sigh filled with bewilderment and pain.

“染柳烟浓，吹梅笛怨，春意知几许” — Newly sprouting willow leaves are veiled in dense mist, while the flute melody 《梅花落》 carries a plaintive tone. Rather than saying directly that plum blossoms have fallen, the poet writes “吹梅笛怨,” using the music to express grief and longing for the former capital.

“元宵佳节，融和天气，次第岂无风雨” — On this Lantern Festival, the weather is mild and harmonious, yet who can be certain that wind and rain will not suddenly come? This is the vigilance of someone who has endured drastic reversals in life: beautiful things are always brief, and storms may arrive at any moment.

“来相召、香车宝马，谢他酒朋诗侣” — Friends of wine and poetry arrive in splendid carriages and on fine horses to invite her out, but she can only decline with courteous words because grief and agitation fill her heart. It is not that she no longer loves festivity; rather, festivity now causes her greater pain.

Lower Stanza — Former Prosperity and Present Decline

“中州盛日，闺门多暇，记得偏重三五” — She recalls the flourishing days of Bianjing, when as a young woman with ample leisure she especially treasured the fifteenth day of the first lunar month. “中州” refers to Bianjing of the Northern Song, while “偏重三五” emphasizes how dearly she once valued the Lantern Festival.

“铺翠冠儿，捻金雪柳，簇带争济楚” — During Lantern Festivals in Bianjing, she wore caps set with kingfisher-feather ornaments and golden silk xueliu hair decorations, dressing carefully and beautifully. This is a concrete re-creation of former splendor: the youthful years of elaborate adornment and graceful display.

“如今憔悴，风鬟霜鬓，怕见夜间出去” — Now her face is worn, her hair disheveled and touched with frost, and she fears even going out at night. The brilliance of the past has become an irretrievable dream.

“不如向、帘儿底下，听人笑语” — Better simply to remain behind the curtain and listen to other people’s laughter. On one level, this is a sigh over the rise and decline of past and present, stirred by the festival scene. On another, she still longs for the Lantern Festivals of former days and tries to revisit old dreams through the bustle outside. To warm oneself with memories while hearing laughter through a curtain—how desolate that is. The lyric employs contrast, writing the Lantern Festivals of Bianjing, capital of the Northern Song, and Lin’an, capital of the Southern Song, in order to express longing for the lost homeland. The upper stanza depicts the sorrow of living far from home during the Lantern Festival, setting the outward happiness of reality against the desolation of her inner state. In the lower stanza, “中州盛日” turns from the present toward memory. The lyric’s genius lies in its ending, “帘儿底下，听人笑语.” She has not truly rejected festivity; she simply cannot enter into it. Her heart is not truly still; she is afraid to touch the memories of the past. Listening to laughter from behind a curtain, she is separated by that single curtain from two worlds, two lives. By placing her private grief against the background of a festival celebrated by all, Li Qingzhao writes sorrow through joy and decline through splendor, multiplying the emotional force.

This lyric was written in the eighth year of the Xining era, 1075, when Su Shi was serving as prefect of Mizhou, present-day Zhucheng in Shandong. Although its title identifies the subject as “Shangyuan in Mizhou,” the lyric begins with the Lantern Festival night in Qiantang, that is, Hangzhou. Su Shi had previously spent three Lantern Festivals there. Lantern light is the defining feature of the festival, and the opening “灯火钱塘三五夜” immediately establishes the grandeur of the scene. Soon after taking office in Mizhou, Su Shi encountered the Lantern Festival. As he walked the streets looking at lanterns and the moon, memories of Hangzhou’s bustling celebration came back to him. The entire lyric contrasts the Shangyuan scenes of Hangzhou and Mizhou, revealing longing for Hangzhou and the loneliness he felt upon first arriving in Mizhou.

The lyric uses broad strokes to capture differences in climate, geography, and custom between Hangzhou and Mizhou, presenting two contrasting visions of the Lantern Festival. Su Shi had spent three Lantern Festivals in Hangzhou and held its local customs in deep regard. The language is plain and unadorned, yet emotionally powerful. The upper stanza gives us the festival beauty of “明月如霜，照见人如画”; the lower falls into the sorrow of “寂寞山城人老也.” From brilliant lights to cold and sparse flames, from people “like paintings” to people grown old, from swelling music to clouds heavy with snow—prosperity and decline, warmth and coldness confront each other, and the poet’s loneliness and unease become palpable. The line “却入农桑社” is especially subtle: the joy of Mizhou’s residents on Lantern Festival night does not take the form of the urban splendor familiar to Su Shi, but of rural worship alien to him, deepening his sense of distance as an “outsider.”

Zhang Hu (c. 785–c. 852), a Tang poet especially known for palace verse, wrote this celebrated Lantern Festival poem with particular attention to court women singing and dancing during the festivities. According to Tang custom, during the Lantern Festival both palace and common neighborhoods throughout Chang’an were hung with lanterns and decorations. The poem combines a sweeping view of the capital’s lights with a close-up of palace music and dance, recreating a festive world in which heaven and earth alike seem filled with song.

This seven-character quatrain reveals the grand through the small. It first establishes the brilliance of the lantern festival: there are “万灯,” three hundred “内人,” and a dance of linked sleeves. The poem alternates between panoramic overview and close-up detail, creating a magnificent scene with imposing scale. Its language is lucid and its images vivid. By focusing on both popular lantern revelry and palace dancing, it uses remarkably concise strokes to evoke the grandeur and joy of the Tang Lantern Festival, making it a representative work of court and populace celebrating together.

Cui Ye was a Tang poet active during the reign of Emperor Zhongzong; his dates are unknown. His sequence Shangyuan Night consists of six seven-character quatrains depicting the prosperous lantern-viewing scenes of Chang’an. Liu Su’s New Tales of the Great Tang records: “神龙（唐中宗年号，公元705—707年）之际，京城正月望日（即十五），盛饰灯影之会，金吾弛禁，特许夜行。贵族戚属及下隶工贾，无不夜游。”

This seven-character quatrain does not describe lantern viewing itself in detail, but rather the conditions and irresistible impulse behind it. Through two rhetorical questions—“谁家见月能闲坐” and “何处闻灯不看来”—the poet captures the collective revelry of Lantern Festival night: no one can resist the attraction of moonlight and lanterns shining together. With apt and characteristic imagery and concise, moving language, the poem depicts the festive joy and prosperous streets of Yuanxiao. Through its lines, one can almost see the crowds, traffic, noise, and restless energy of the celebration.

Lu Zhaolin (c. 636–c. 695), courtesy name Shengzhi and literary name Youyouzi, was one of the Four Great Poets of the Early Tang. This poem describes Lantern Festival decorations from both distant and close perspectives. Seen from afar they resemble stars fallen to earth; seen nearby they look like the moon suspended beside towers. The parallelism is meticulously balanced, giving distinctive expression to the festival’s colorful brilliance. At a deeper level, the poem reveals a particular ethics of seeing that belongs to Lu Zhaolin: even when standing at the margins of his age and repeatedly frustrated in official life, the poet continues to use the brush as his eye—to gaze upon beauty and give names to splendor.

The poem describes Lantern Festival decorations from both distant and close perspectives. “缛彩遥分地，繁光远缀天” is a wide-angle view, showing the number, brightness, and beauty of the lanterns. The characters “遥” and “远” suggest a celebration spread across the realm, with lamps lit everywhere. “接汉疑星落，依楼似月悬” compares lanterns with stars and the moon, merging heaven and the human world. The final “别有千金笑，来映九枝前” sets human faces against lantern light, giving the festival’s beauty a warmth of human feeling. The poem is meticulously parallel and richly colored, one of the finest Lantern Festival works of the Early Tang.

Tang Yin (1470–1524), courtesy name Bohu and literary name Liuru Jushi, was a celebrated Ming painter and poet. In accessible and lucid language, this poem depicts the joy of Lantern Festival night: lanterns and moonlight shining together, village girls filling the streets, and music surging everywhere. There is painting within the poem, presenting both a nocturnal Lantern Festival scene and a vivid picture of lantern-viewing customs.

Unlike the cool melancholy that often appears in literati poems on festivals, this poem is filled with the warmth and exuberance of ordinary life, taking both the fullness of spring and human delight to their utmost. What a line: “有灯无月不娱人.” On Lantern Festival night, lanterns and moonlight are both indispensable. With the eye of a painter and calligrapher, Tang Yin captures the festival’s play of light: lanterns and moon illuminate one another, while human beings and spring seem to merge. The poem is easy to understand, yet every line is finely judged, overflowing with love of life and gratitude for a beautiful moment. “春到人间人似玉” — spring is not merely a season but a state of life; the Lantern Festival is not merely a festival but an attitude toward living.