This poem was written on the New Year’s Eve of the Gengzi Year, which was the year of the Eight-Nation Alliance’s invasion of China in 1900. At that time, the Eight-Nation Alliance’s invasion was banned, and Empress Dowager Cixi fled to Xi’an with Emperor Guangxu. At that time, the author of the poem, Zhu Zumou, was trapped in the Xichang Toutiao Hutong outside Xuanwumen, the residence of Wang Pengyun. It was New Year’s Eve, but he could not go home, so several of them wrote poems together to express the hatred of the country. This poem “Partridge Sky” was written at this time.
这首词写于庚子年除夕那天，正是1900年光绪二十六年八国联军侵华那年，那时八国联军侵袭被禁，慈禧太后带着光绪帝逃到西安。当时词的作者朱祖谋困居在宣武门外校场头条胡同，王鹏运的住所。那天正是除夕夜，但是他却回不得家，于是他们几人一起填词书法家国之恨。这首《鹧鸪天》就是写于这个时候。
朱孝臧·《鹧鸪天·庚子岁除》
似水清尊照鬓华，
尊前人易老天涯。
酒肠芒角森如戟，
吟笔冰霜惨不花。
抛枕坐，
卷书嗟，
莫嫌啼煞后栖鸦。
烛花红换人间世，
山色青回梦里家。
Tune: Che-ku t’ien
New Year’s Eve in the Year Keng-tzu
Chu Hsiao-Tsang
A cup of wine as clear as water
reflects my temples going white.
With such a cup, away from home
one easily grows old.
The prickly points of my drunken guts
are as terrible as a row of spears.
The poetry brush, icy and frosted,
sadly cannot bloom.
I throw away the pillow and sit up.
I roll up the book and sigh.
I don’t mind
the screaming of the last roosting crow.
The red of candle wax flowers
changes the world where people live.
The green of mountain shining
brings back the home I dream of.
