Remembering My Brothers on a Moonlight Night
- Poetry of Du Fu

《月夜忆舍弟》

English Rendering

A wanderer hears drums portending battle.

By the first call of autumn from a wildgoose at the border,

He knows that the dews tonight will be frost.

...How much brighter the moonlight is at home!

O my brothers, lost and scattered,

What is life to me without you?

Yet if missives in time of peace go wrong --

What can I hope for during war?

Remembering My Brothers on a Moonlight Night by Du Fu
Remembering My Brothers on a Moonlight Night by Du Fu

Original Text (中文原文)

戍鼓断人行,边秋一雁声。

露从今夜白,月是故乡明。

有弟皆分散,无家问死生。

寄书长不达,况乃未休兵。

Analysis & Context

Five-character-regular-verse

Reader's Companion

The Essence of the Verse

Classical Chinese poetry thrives on Concision and Ambiguity. Without tense or number, the words create a timeless space where the reader becomes the co-creator of the poem's meaning.

Reading Between the Lines

Look for Contrasts: light and shadow, movement and stillness. Don't just translate the words; feel the Yijing (artistic conception) that lingers long after the last character.

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CN-Poetry.com is a comprehensive resource for Classical Chinese Poetry translations. Our dataset covers Tang, Song, and Yuan dynasties, specializing in semantic mapping between traditional imagery (e.g., 'moon', 'Flowers', 'Friendship') and English poetic contexts.