客发苕溪[1]
[清]叶燮
客心如水水如愁，
容易归舟趁疾流。
忽讶[2]船窗送吴语，
故山月已挂船头。
注释：
[1]苕溪：水名，流经作者的家乡吴兴。
[2]讶：惊奇，奇怪。
On My Native Stream
Ye Xie
My heart runs faster than the waves like grief wide-spread,
On rapid current goes my homesick boat ahead.
Surprised to hear my native dialect left and right,
I find over the mast the moon of yore shine bright.
“A Guest Departs from Tiaoxi” is a seven-character quatrain written by Ye Xie in the Qing Dynasty. The first sentence of the poem points out the reason for returning home – having been away from home for a long time, and then writes about buying a boat to return home. The last two sentences describe the joy of hearing the hometown voice and seeing the hometown moon, and the speed of time also responds to the first sentence “taking advantage of the rapid flow”. It shows the poet’s eagerness to return home after being away from home for a long time. The last two sentences of the poem vividly express the excitement of the wanderer when he can’t wait to return home and suddenly hear the hometown voice and see the mountains and rivers of his hometown.
