Three Poems by 白居易 Bái Jūyì in Exile

The Turn of the Year 815: From Imperial Remonstrance to the Silence of 江州 Jiāngzhōu

To understand the existential weight of the《浔阳春三首》Xúnyángchūn sānshǒu, "Three Poems on Spring in Xúnyáng," we must situate ourselves in the summer of 815 CE, the tenth year of the 元和 Yuánhé reign era. Until that point, 白居易 Bái Jūyì, aged 44, had built his career around a very definite conviction: that poetry and direct speech addressed to the emperor could help redress the ills of the realm. He had served as a member of the 翰林 Hànlín Academy and held office as an admonishing official, yet by 815 he occupied neither of these positions. Having completed the extended mourning period for the death of his mother, he returned to court in 814 as 太子左赞善大夫 tàizǐ zuǒ zànshàn dàfū, Left Mentor to the Crown Prince—an official attached to the heir apparent's retinue.

The atmosphere in the capital, 长安 Cháng'ān, however, had grown suffocating. Emperor 宪宗 Xiànzōng was attempting to curb the autonomous power of rebellious regional military commissioners, unleashing a covert war in the shadows.

An Assassination at Dawn

The turning point arrived on the third day of the sixth lunar month of 815. Chief Minister 武元衡 Wǔ Yuánhéng was assassinated in the streets of the capital as he rode toward court before daybreak. The assassins were dispatched by 李师道 Lǐ Shīdào, one of the powerful military governors of the 山东 Shāndōng region who defied imperial authority. In the same ambush, another official was wounded.

The court was paralyzed by terror. While the rest of the officials remained silent out of fear of retribution, 白居易 Bái Jūyì, faithful to his Confucian ethos of "rectification," immediately submitted a memorial to the throne demanding an urgent investigation and the punishment of the perpetrators.

This act of courage proved to be his undoing. His political rivals at court, whom 白居易 Bái Jūyì had targeted for years through his satirical verse, seized the opportunity. They brought two charges against him:

• An administrative infraction: Being an advisor linked to the legacy of the 翰林 Hànlín Academy (1) and not an officially appointed censor (谏官 jiànguān), (2) it was argued that he had exceeded his jurisdictional bounds by speaking before the designated remonstrance officials had done so.

• A moral offense (as a pretext): In a cruel maneuver, they accused him of a lack of filial piety. Because his mother had died after falling into a well while viewing blossoms, his detractors alleged that the poems of 白居易 Bái Jūyì celebrating flowers or mentioning wells demonstrated an appalling callousness. The accusation was particularly perverse: poems composed long before his mother's death were weaponized as evidence of his alleged unfilial conduct.

Under these fabricated charges, he was demoted and banished from the capital. Although initially assigned to an even more distant post, he was ultimately appointed 司马 sīmǎ (Adjutant) of 江州 Jiāngzhōu Prefecture. During this era, this office served in practice as a dumping ground for disgraced officials: a sinecure with a stipend but stripped of real authority, devoid of administrative responsibilities, and—most painful of all for an activist statesman—bereft of a political voice.

It was here, in the ancient city of 湓 Pén, that 白居易 Bái Jūyì composed these lines. Spring in 浔阳 Xúnyáng represents far more than a seasonal transition: it constitutes the backdrop to a profound inner metamorphosis. The official who had trusted in words to alter the empire's trajectory now found himself cast out of the court, compelled to reconsider what it means to act when stripped of the agency to do so. In 江州 Jiāngzhōu, another dimension of his intellectual horizon began to gain prominence: withdrawal, introspective reflection, intimate friendship, landscape, and an deepening engagement with Buddhism.

The《浔阳春三首》Xúnyángchūn sānshǒu, "Three Poems on Spring in Xúnyáng," are therefore not mere spring lyrics. Read against the political ruin of their author, they assume an entirely different resonance: the regenerating season stands in stark counterpoint to a man whose court career had just been severed.

1. 《春生》 Chūnshēng 

Spring Arrives

春生何处暗周游 

Chūnshēng héchù ànzhōuyóu 

Where is spring born, wandering secretly about?

海角天涯遍始休 

Hǎijiǎo tiānyá biànshǐxiū 

Only having crossed the seas' capes and heaven's ends does it pause to rest.

先遣和风报消息 

Xiānqiǎn héfēng bàoxiāoxī 

First it sends the gentle breeze to deliver the news,

续教啼鸟说来由 

Xùjiào tíninǎo shuōláiyóu 

Then instructs the calling birds to explain where it comes from.

展张草色长河畔 

Zhánzhāng cǎosè 

Chánghé pàn It spreads the colors of grass along the banks of the Long River,

点缀花房小树头 

Diǎnzhuì huāfáng xiǎoshùtóu 

And studs the small treetops with clusters of blossoms.

若到故园应觅我 

Ruòdào gùyuán yīngmìwǒ 

If you reach my old garden, you ought to seek me out,

为传沦落在江州 

Wèichuán lúnluò zài Jiāngzhōu 

To pass along the word that I have fallen low, stranded in Jiāngzhōu.

2. 《春来》Chūnlái 

Spring Comes

春来触地故乡情 

Chūnlái chùdì gùxiāngqíng 

Spring arrives, brushing the earth with longing for my native home;

忽见风光忆两京 

Hūjiàn fēngguāng yì Liǎngjīng 

Suddenly seeing this landscape, I recall the Two Capitals. (3)

金谷踏花香骑入 

Jīngǔ tàhuā xiāngqírù 

In the Golden Valley, fragrant cavalcades rode in, treading upon blossoms;

曲江碾草钿车行 

Qūjiāng niǎncǎo diànchēxíng 

Along the Qū River, pearl-inlaid carriages rolled by, crushing the grass.

谁家绿酒欢连夜 

Shuíjiā lǜjiǔ huānliányè 

In whose house does green wine make merry through the night? (4)

何处红楼睡失明 

Héchù hónglóu shuìshīmíng 

In which red mansion do they sleep right through the dawn?

独有不眠不醉客 

Dúyǒu bùmián bùzuìkè 

There is only this guest who neither sleeps nor gets drunk,

经春冷坐古湓城 

Jīngchūn lěngzuò gǔ Pénchéng 

Sitting in the cold through spring within the ancient city of  Pén.

3.《春去》Chūnqù 

Spring Departs

一从泽畔为迁客 

Yīcóng zépàn wéi qiānkè 

Ever since becoming an exile by the marshy shore,

两度江头送暮春 

Liǎngdù jiāngtóu sòngmùchūn 

Twice have I seen off late spring at the river's edge.

白发更添今日鬓 

Báifà gèngtiān jīnrìbìn 

White hairs add further frost to my temples today,

青衫不改去年身 

Qīngshān bùgǎi qùniánshēn 

Yet the blue robe on my frame remains unchanged from last year.

百川未有回流水 

Bǎichuān wèiyǒu huíliúshuǐ 

Of a hundred rivers, not one carries flowing waters backward;

一老终无却少人 

Yīlǎo zhōngwú quèshàorén 

Once grown old, no man ever returns to his youth.

四十六时三月尽 

Sìshíliù shí sānyuèjìn 

At forty-six, as the third month draws to a close,

送春争得不殷勤 

Sòngchūn zhēngdé bùyīnqín 

How could I fail to be earnest in seeing off the spring?

From Political Complaint to Existential Acceptance

Read in sequence, the "Three Poems on Spring in Xúnyáng" delineate an emotional geography of exile. If the opening poem attempts to nullify spatial distance by enlisting the season as a personal messenger, the second poem seeks shelter in the sensory memory of the imperial capitals to evade a desolate present. Yet it is in the third poem that this grievance assumes its deepest philosophical dimension.

Here, 白居易 Bái Jūyì confronts the absolute irreversibility of time. The natural world abides by the cyclic renewal of the seasons: spring unfailingly returns. Humanity, by contrast, is bound to a linear, unidirectional progression. The river becomes the supreme emblem of this asymmetry: "Of a hundred rivers, not one carries flowing waters backward" (百川未有回流水 Bǎichuān wèiyǒu huíliúshuǐ). The plight of the exile is thus not merely spatial, but temporal: while nature regenerates its vital cycle, man ages and discovers that critical horizons of his life are permanently lost.

The 青衫 qīngshān, or blue robe—the garment designating lower-echelon bureaucratic rank—evolves into an emblem of his altered condition: that of a scholar cast out from the imperial center, fated to watch the march of time continue without him.

Yet, within this earnest devotion to bidding spring farewell, something transcending mere nostalgia begins to emerge. The resentment of the wronged official makes room for another vantage point: that of a poet observing the impermanence (无常 wúcháng) inherent in his own human predicament. Buddhism would later provide 白居易 Bái Jūyì with a particularly potent conceptual vocabulary to articulate this transience, but these verses still capture a transitional phase, written while the political injury remained raw.

It was during this exile in 江州 Jiāngzhōu, under the shadow of the monasteries of Mount 庐山 Lúshān, that this intellectual shift solidified. The man who had placed his faith in civic action had to learn to live when action was denied him. Years later, he would recast himself as the tranquil 香山居士 Xiāngshān jūshì, the "Hermit of the Fragrant Mountain." Between the injured minister of 815 and the retired recluse of his mature years lay a profound journey. These three poems stand precisely on that threshold: not yet expressing tranquil detachment, but capturing the exact juncture where grief begins to transform into philosophical contemplation.

This article was originally published in Spanish: Tres poemas de 白居易 Bái Jūyì en el exilio

(1) The 翰林院 Hànlínyuàn, or Hànlín Academy, was an elite imperial bureau operating directly within the palace precincts. Its scholars served as private secretaries and confidential advisors to the emperor, tasked with drafting imperial rescripts and edicts. Membership afforded immediate access to the inner court (the locus of personal imperial power) while lacking formal executive authority in the outer court (the institutional bureaucracy). This ambiguity became the political snare for 白居易 Bái Jūyì: he possessed the intimacy to speak directly to the emperor, but lacked the formal administrative mandate to initiate judicial procedures, leaving him exposed to retaliation from rivals in the regular bureaucracy.

(2) Within the 唐 Táng administrative apparatus, the 谏官 jiànguān (Remonstrance Officials or Imperial Censors) were endowed with the codified, institutionalized duty to criticize imperial policies, dispute decisions, and admonish the throne.

(3) During the 唐 Táng dynasty, the empire operated under a dual-capital system:

• The Western Capital (西京 Xījīng): 长安 Cháng'ān (modern 西安 Xī'ān). The political and administrative center, seat of the throne and the central imperial administration.

• The Eastern Capital (东京 Dōngjīng): 洛阳 Luòyáng. A vital cultural and commercial hub, serving as a secondary imperial residence.

In the poem, 白居易 Bái Jūyì invokes the 曲江 Qūjiāng, or Qū River (Serpentine Canal), the preeminent public pleasure ground in 长安 Cháng'ān celebrated for banquets celebrating successful imperial examination candidates, as well as the 金谷 Jīngǔ, or Golden Valley, a legendary estate on the outskirts of 洛阳 Luòyáng.

(4) The term 绿酒 lǜjiǔ, or "green wine," designates freshly brewed, unfiltered rice wine. During the 唐 Táng dynasty, the natural fermentation process left floating sediment and a delicate green foam across the surface of the liquid. In this poem, the green tone of the wine provides a chromatic counterpoint to the red mansions evoked in the succeeding verse.

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Yang, X. (2003). Metamorphosis of the Private Sphere: Gardens and Objects in Tang-Song Poetry. Harvard University Asia Center.