Ballad of Yan, with Preface
English translation and interpretation are being reviewed.
客有从元戎出塞而还者，
作《燕歌行》以示，
适感征戍之事，
因而和焉。
汉家烟尘在东北，
汉将辞家破残贼。
男儿本自重横行，
天子非常赐颜色。
摐金伐鼓下榆关，
旌旆逶迤碣石间。
校尉羽书飞瀚海，
单于猎火照狼山。
山川萧条极边土，
胡骑凭陵杂风雨。
战士军前半死生，
美人帐下犹歌舞。
大漠穷秋塞草腓，
孤城落日斗兵稀。
身当恩遇常轻敌，
力尽关山未解围。
铁衣远戍辛勤久，
玉箸应啼别离后。
少妇城南欲断肠，
征人蓟北空回首。
边庭飘飖那可度，
绝域苍茫无所有。
杀气三时作阵云，
寒声一夜传刁斗。
相看白刃血纷纷，
死节从来岂顾勋！
君不见沙场征战苦，
至今犹忆李将军。
English translation
In the twenty-sixth year of the Kaiyuan reign, a friend who had followed the commander beyond the frontier and come back wrote a Song of Yan and showed it to me; moved by the troubles of the garrisons, I answered it with this.
The smoke and dust of Han is in the northeast; the Han generals leave their homes to break the remnant foe.
A man by nature prizes ranging free; the Son of Heaven has shown him extraordinary favor.
Beating gongs and drums, they march down to Yuguan; their banners wind on and on among the hills of Jieshi.
The colonel's feathered dispatch flies over the desert sands; the Chanyu's hunting fires light up Wolf Mountain.
Hills and streams lie desolate to the very edge of the land; the Hu riders press close, mingled with wind and rain.
At the front, half the soldiers are dead, half alive; in the general's tent the beauties still sing and dance.
In the vast desert at autumn's end the frontier grass withers; by the lonely fortress at sunset the fighting men grow few.
Bearing the emperor's grace, they have always made light of the foe; their strength spent among the passes, the siege is never lifted.
In iron mail they garrison far away, long and wearily; the tears must have flowed ever since the parting.
The young wife south of the city is near heartbroken; the soldier north of Ji turns his head in vain.
The frontier is wild and stormy — how can it be crossed? The far land is vast, with nothing at all in it.
The air of slaughter through the three watches builds battle-clouds; the chill sound all night long passes round the clappers.
They look at one another's bare blades, and the blood is everywhere; death in duty was never for the sake of glory!
Have you not seen the bitterness of war upon the sands? Even now men still remember General Li.
Meaning
In the twenty-sixth year of the Kaiyuan reign of Emperor Xuanzong of the Tang, a man who had followed the commander-in-chief beyond the frontier and returned wrote a Song of Yan and showed it to me. Moved by all that belongs to the frontier garrisons, I wrote this Song of Yan in answer to him.
On the northeastern border of Han the fighting breaks out again; the general leaves his home to go and punish the raiders.
Background
Read the background
"Song of Yan" was written in 738 (the twenty-sixth year of the Kaiyuan era), after Gao Shi returned from the Qi region to Liang and Song. Though it uses an old Music Bureau title, it was written in response to events of the day. Commentators through the ages have never examined the historical facts behind the preface in detail, and all have taken it as an attack upon Zhang Shougui, whose subordinate generals forged orders to attack the Xi and Khitan and whose false reports of victory followed their defeat. Yet in "Seeing Off My Cousin Once Removed, Shi Yan, at Songzhong," written in 739 (the twenty-seventh year of Kaiyuan), Gao Shi speaks of Zhang Shougui with the utmost admiration. Many others hold that the objects of the satire were An Lushan, Zhao Kan, and Bai Zhentuoluo. Earlier still, between 730 (the eighteenth year of Kaiyuan) and 733 (the twenty-first year), Gao Shi had traveled north to You and Ji, and thus knew well the life of the northeastern frontier garrisons. Judging from the text itself, this poem is not an ordinary exchange written merely from what a traveler beyond the frontier had seen and heard, nor is it confined to the affairs of Zhang Shougui.
From the eighteenth year of Kaiyuan to the twelfth month of the twenty-second year, the Khitan repeatedly raided the Tang border. In the twentieth year of Kaiyuan, Li Yi, Prince of Xin'an, campaigned against the Xi and Khitan; Gao Shi went north to Youyan hoping to serve in the prince's headquarters, but did not succeed. After the twenty-first year of Kaiyuan, Zhang Shougui, the military governor of Youzhou, took charge of frontier affairs and at first won victories. But in the twenty-fourth year Zhang sent An Lushan, the expedition commander of Pinglu, to attack the Xi and Khitan, and "Lushan, trusting in his courage, advanced rashly and was defeated by the barbarians" (Comprehensive Mirror to Aid in Government, chapter 215). In the twenty-sixth year of Kaiyuan, the Youzhou generals Zhao Kan and Bai Zhentuoluo forged Zhang Shougui's orders to compel Wu Zhiyi, commander of the Pinglu army, to march against the Xi and Khitan; they won at first and were routed afterward. "Shougui concealed the truth of the matter and falsely reported a victory won" (Old Tang History, "Biography of Zhang Shougui"). Gao Shi was deeply moved by the two defeats that followed the twenty-fourth year of Kaiyuan, and therefore wrote this poem.