Listen to this article冯康侯 篆书：杜甫《江汉》
【释文】江汉思归客，乾坤一腐儒。片云天共远，永夜月同孤。落日心犹壮，秋风病欲疏。古来存老马，不必取长途。
【款识】维森世讲疋属。丁巳莫春，七七叟冯康侯篆。
【注释】江汉：指长江和汉水。此诗为杜甫在历三年（ 768）秋漂泊于江陵时所作。江陵属于江汉流域地区，故取以为题。思归客、腐儒：均作者自谓。腐儒：迂腐无用的儒生（读书人）。乾坤：天地。远：遥远，远浮。永夜：长夜。孤：孤独，孤悬。“片云”二句，言自己与片云同在远天，与孤月共度长夜，处境寂寞凄凉。落日：日薄西山的意思，这里比喻自己已近暮年。苏：复苏。此有康复意。“秋风”一句，化用李白的“我觉秋兴逸，谁云秋兴悲？”以表现自己身处逆境而壮心不已的思想。存：收养。老马：作者自比，用《韩非子·说林上》“老马识途”的故事。“古来”二句，通过说对于老马应该取其善于识途的长处，而不必要它效奔驰之力，进上步表现诗人老当益壮的情怀。长途：代指驱驰之力。
【简析】
大历三年（768）正月，杜甫自夔州出峡，流寓湖北江陵、公安等地。这时他已五十六岁，北归无望，生计日蹙。此诗以首句头两字“江汉”为题，正是漂泊流徒的标志。尽管如此，诗人孤忠仍存，壮心犹在，此诗就集中地表现了一种到老不衰、顽强不息的精神，十分感人。
“江汉”句，表现出诗人客滞江汉的窘境。“思归客”三字饱含无限的辛酸，因为诗人思归而不能归，成为天涯沦落人。“乾坤”代指天地。“乾坤”句包含“自鄙而兼自负”这样两层意思，妙在“一腐儒”上冠以“乾坤”二字。“身在草野，心忧社稷，乾坤之内，此腐儒能有几人？”（《杜诗说》）黄生对这句诗的理解，是深得诗人用心的。
“片云”二句紧扣首句，对仗十分工整。通过眼前自然景物的描写，诗人把他“思归”之情表现得很深沉。他由远浮天边的片云，孤悬明月的永夜，联想到了自己客中情事，仿佛自己就与云、月共远同孤一样。这样就把自己的感情和身外的景物融为一片。诗人表面上是在写片云孤月，实际是在写自己：虽然远在天外，他的一片忠心却象孤月一样的皎洁。昔人认为这两句“情景相融，不能区别”，是很能说明它的特点的。
“落日”二句直承次句，生动形象地表现出诗人积极用世的精神。《周易》云：“君子以自强不息。”这恰好说明：次句的腐儒，并非纯是诗人对自己的鄙薄。上联明明写了永夜、孤月，本联的落日，就决不是写实景，而是用作比喻。黄生指出：“落日乃借喻暮齿”，是咏怀而非写景。否则一首律诗中，既见孤月，又见落日，是自相矛盾的。他的话很有道理。落日相当于“日薄西山”的意思。“落日”句的本意，就是“暮年心犹壮”。它和曹操“烈士暮年，壮心不已”（《步出夏门行·龟虽寿》）的诗意，是一致的。就律诗格式说，此联用的是借对法。“落日”与“秋风”相对，但“落日”实际上是比喻“暮年”。“秋风”句是写实。“苏”有康复意。诗人飘流江汉，而对飒飒秋风，不仅没有悲秋之感，反而觉得“病欲苏”。这与李白“我觉秋兴逸，谁云秋兴悲”的思想境界，颇为相似，表现出诗人身处逆境而壮心不已的精神状态。胡应麟《诗薮·内篇》卷四赞扬此诗的二、三联“含阔大于沉深”，是十分精当的。
这两联诗的意境，苏轼曾深得其妙，他贬谪岭外、晚年归来时，曾有诗云：“浮云世事改，孤月此心明”（《次韵江晦叔二首》），表明他不因政治上遭到打击迫害，而改变自己匡国利民的态度。“孤月此心明”实际上就是从杜诗“永夜月同孤”和“落日心犹壮”两句化用而成的。
“古来”二句，再一次表现了诗人老当益壮的情怀。“老马”用了《韩非子·说林上》“老马识途”的故事：齐桓公伐孤竹返，迷惑失道。他接受管仲“老马之智可用”的建议，放老马而随之，果然“得道”。“老马”是诗人自比，“长途”代指驱驰之力。诗人指出，古人存养老马，不是取它的力，而是用他的智。我虽是一个“腐儒”，但心犹壮，病欲苏，同老马一样，并不是没有一点用处的。诗人在这里显然含有怨愤之意：莫非我真是一个毫无可取的腐儒，连一匹老马都不如么？这是诗人言外之意，是从诗句中自然流露出来的。
此诗用凝炼的笔触，抒发了诗人怀才见弃的不平之气和报国思用的慷慨情思。诗的中间四句，情景相融，妙合无垠，有着强烈的艺术感染力，历来为人所称道。
【Simple Translation】
In the first month of the third year of the Dali calendar (768), Du Fu left Kui Prefecture and went into exile in Jiangling and Public Security in Hubei. He was fifty-six years old at the time, with no hope of returning to the north, and his livelihood was in dire straits. This poem is titled with the first two words of the first line “Jiang Han”, which is a sign of his wandering and exile. Nevertheless, the poet’s loneliness and loyalty are still there, and this poem concentrates on a spirit of perseverance and persistence in old age, which is very touching.
The line “Jiang Han” shows the poet’s dilemma of being stranded in Jiang Han. The three words “thinking of returning” are full of sorrows, because the poet is thinking of returning but cannot do so, and has become a fallen man at the end of the earth. The word “Qiankun” refers to heaven and earth. The line “Qiankun” contains two meanings, “self-contempt and self-conceit”, and is wonderful because the word “Qiankun” is placed on top of “a corrupt scholar”. The word “qiankun” is used to refer to heaven and earth. The phrase “in the wilderness, but worried about the country and society, how many of these rotten scholars can be found in the Qiankun?” （Huang Sheng’s understanding of this verse is well understood by the poet.
The two lines “piece of clouds” are closely linked to the first line, and the couplets are very neat. Through the description of the natural scenery in front of him, the poet expresses his feelings of “longing for home” in a very deep way. From the clouds floating in the sky and the moon hanging alone in the eternal night, he associates them with his own love affairs in the guest house, as if he were alone with the clouds and the moon. In this way, his feelings and the scenery outside his body are blended together. On the surface, the poet is writing about the clouds and the lonely moon, but in reality, he is writing about himself: although he is far away from the sky, his loyalty is as bright as the lonely moon. In the past, these two lines were considered to be “a blend of scenes that cannot be distinguished from each other”, which is a good description of its characteristics.
The two lines “the setting sun” directly follow the next line, vividly expressing the poet’s positive spirit of using the world. As the Book of Zhouyi says, “The gentleman is self-improving.” This shows that the poet’s contempt for himself is not purely reflected in the second line. The previous line clearly wrote about the eternal night and the lonely moon, the sunset of this line, it is not a real scene, but used as a metaphor. Huang Sheng pointed out: “the sunset is a metaphor for the twilight teeth”, is a chanting rather than writing scenery. Otherwise a poem, both the moon and the sunset, is self-contradictory. His words make sense. The setting sun is equivalent to the meaning of “the sun is thin in the west”. The original meaning of the line “the setting sun” is “the heart is still strong in the twilight”. It is the same as Cao Cao’s poem “A martyr in his twilight years has a strong heart” (“Stepping out of the Summer Gate Line – Although the Turtle Lives”). In terms of the form of the poem, this couplet is a borrowed pair. The words “sunset” and “autumn breeze” are opposite, but “sunset” is actually a metaphor for “old age”. The line “autumn breeze” is a realistic one. The word “Su” has the meaning of rehabilitation. The poet is floating in the river and Han, but instead of feeling sad about the autumn breeze, he feels “sick and ready to recover”. This is quite similar to Li Bai’s state of mind of “I feel sad in the autumn, who is sad in the autumn”, which shows the poet’s unrelenting state of mind in the face of adversity. The second and third couplets of this poem, which are praised by Hu Yinglin in his poem “The Poetry Yard – The Inner Chapter”, volume 4, are very accurate, as they “contain broadness and depth”.
When he was relegated to other parts of the world and returned in his later years, he had a poem saying, “The floating clouds have changed, but the lonely moon is clear” (“Second Rhyme to Jiang Hi-Shu”), showing that he would not change his attitude of helping the country and the people because of the persecution in politics. The phrase “The lonely moon is bright” is actually a translation of the lines “The moon is lonely at night” and “The heart is still strong at sunset” from Du’s poem.
The two lines of “Ancient” once again express the poet’s sentiment of being old and strong. “The story of “The Old Horse” from Han Fei Zi (韓非子 – 说林上) is used: Duke Huan of Qi returned from the expedition of the Lonely Bamboo and was confused and lost his way. He accepted Guan Zhong’s advice of “the wisdom of the old horse is available” and let the old horse go with him, and he really “got the way”. “The poet compares himself to an old horse, and the word “long distance” refers to the power of driving. The poet pointed out that the ancients saved the old horse, not by taking its strength, but by using its wisdom. Although I am a “rotten scholar”, my heart is still strong and I want to recover from my illness, just like the old horse, I am not useless. The poet here obviously contains a sense of resentment: Am I really a rotten scholar with nothing to offer, even worse than an old horse? This is the poet’s meaning beyond his words, which flows naturally from the verses.
The poem expresses the poet’s indifference and generosity in his desire to serve his country with his refined brushwork. The middle four stanzas of the poem are a blend of scenes and a wonderful combination, and have a strong artistic impact, which has been praised for ages.
