一剪梅·红藕香残玉簟秋 The Pink Lotus Scent Has Faded

The Pink Lotus Scent Has Faded

—to the tune of Yijianmei

Chinese original by Li Qingzhao

New English version by Julia Min

Older En. Trans. by G. Osing, J. Min & H. Haipeng.

The pink lotus scent has faded,

The bamboo mat chilled.

Slowly, I undo my brocade,

Sighing as I step onto my boat, alone.

Any messenger in the clouds?

All flying geese have gone home—

No letter for me on silk,

Just the moon on the west porch, glows.

Whatever bloomed has fallen;

Whatever flowed, flows still.

We are two sorrowful worlds apart,

Yet one sickness seizes us both.

Nothing can ease or erase

This longing we hold—

What the brow loosens,

All the more the heart would infold.

For appreciation:

According to Another Collection of Li Qingzhao, this ci was written in 1101, shortly after her marriage to Zhao Mingcheng. He was travelling far away, and she reputedly sent him this poem painted on a silk handkerchief—a gesture of special intimacy in those days. The poem is sometimes printed under the title "Sorrow for Departure."

The poem opens with sensory stillness—the faded lotus scent, the chilled bamboo mat—establishing a mood of quiet solitude. She then undoes her brocade robe and steps onto a boat alone, her sigh woven into the movement.

In the second stanza, a rhetorical question—“Any messenger in the clouds?”—breaks the silence, only to meet absence. Flying geese were often taken as messengers of lovers, yet here “All flying geese have gone home— / No letter for me on silk.” The moon on the west porch, glowing past midnight, reveals she has waited through the night.

The central couplet reflects on time’s passage: “Whatever bloomed has fallen; / Whatever flowed, flows still.” Yet their shared longing binds them: “We are two sorrowful worlds apart, / Yet one sickness seizes us both.”

The closing lines are among the most celebrated in Chinese poetry:

“What the brow loosens,

All the more the heart would infold.”

Li Qingzhao captures the paradox: when one stops frowning, the matter of the frown enters the heart and becomes its burden.

What makes this poem remarkable is its openness. In medieval, feudal China, convention discouraged a lady from expressing loneliness for her husband so directly. Sending this poem on a silk handkerchief was an act of personal and artistic intimacy—a woman claiming the right to name her solitude and share it across the distance.

Chinese original:

一剪梅·红藕香残玉簟秋

作者：李清照

红藕香残玉簟秋。

轻解罗裳，独上兰舟。

云中谁寄锦书来？

雁字回时，月满西楼。

花自飘零水自流。

一种相思，两处闲愁。

此情无计可消除，

才下眉头，却上心头。

Pinying and Word -For-Word Translation:

yī jiǎn méi – the musical tune

hóng ǒu xiāng cán yù diàn qiū - pink lotus fragrance fade, bamboo mat autumn cold

qīng jiě luó shang - slowly take off brocade dress,

dú shàng lán zhōu - alone step on the boat.

yún zhōng shuí jì jǐn shū lái - from the clouds who sends silk letter to me.

yàn zì huí shí - swallow character return time,

yuè mǎn xī lóu - moonlight fills the west balcony.

huā zì piāo líng shuǐ zì liú - flower itself falls, water itself flows.

yī zhǒng xiàng sī - one kind of lovesickness,

liǎng chù xián chou - two places sorrow.

cǐ qíng wú jì kě xiāo chú - this feeling no way to drive away.

cái xià méi tóu - just down from the eyebrows,

què shàng xīn tóu - but up to the heart.

Reference:

1.     Older version: Blooming Alone in Winter by Gordon Osing, Julia Min, and Huang Haipeng, published by the People's Publication House Henan Province in 1990 (《寒心未肯随春态》戈登. 奥赛茵，闵晓红，黄海鹏) – “To the Tune of Yijianmei –The fragrance of pink lotus faded, the bamboo mat chilled, / slowly I undo my brocade, sighing, and step alone to my boat. / The clouds were no letters wafted to me on silk, / no swallow’s letters mine; the moon’s in the west porch, glowing. // Whatever has bloomed and fallen, whatever flows still, / in two sorrowful worlds one heartsickness endures. / Nothing can dull or drive away what we feel; / what the brow loosens the heart holds all the more.”

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