Meditations on Ancient Sites: No. 5
English translation and interpretation are being reviewed.
宗臣遗像肃清高。
三分割据纡筹策，
万古云霄一羽毛。
伯仲之间见伊吕，
指挥若定失萧曹。
运移汉祚终难复，
志决身歼军务劳。
English translation
Zhuge's great name endures throughout the universe, the revered minister's portrait austere and lofty.
The threefold division came of his patient planning, ten thousand ages of cloud and sky, a single feather.
On a level with Yi Yin and Lü Shang, composed in command, he surpassed Xiao and Cao.
Fortune shifted, the Han mandate could not be restored, his will was fixed, his life consumed by the labors of war.
Meaning
Zhuge Liang's great name reaches to the universe and flows fragrant through all ages; his pure integrity commands boundless reverence.
The division of the realm into three was the fruit of his painstaking design; he was like a luan phoenix spreading its wings and soaring among the clouds.
His surpassing genius is hard to rank below Yi Yin and Lü Shang; his command of a thousand hosts is beyond the match of Cao Can or Xiao He.
The fortune of the Han had already declined past restoring; his will was steadfast, yet he died at last worn out by the burdens of war.
Background
Read the background
"Meditations on Ancient Sites" in five poems comprises works in which Du Fu sings of ancient sites and commemorates men of old, and thereby gives voice to his own feelings. In 766, the first year of the Dali era of Emperor Daizong of Tang, Du Fu left Kuizhou, passed through the Three Gorges, and reached Jiangling, visiting in turn the old dwelling of Yu Xin, the house of Song Yu, Zhaojun Village, Yong'an Palace, the Temple of the Late Lord, and the Temple of the Marquis of Wu. Profoundly reverent toward the men of talent, the great beauties, the heroes, and the famous ministers of antiquity, he wrote this suite of poems to express his feelings. This poem is one of them.