Sang Rou (The Soft Mulberry)

"Tender Mulberry"

Preface: "Tender Mulberry" is a poem by the Earl of Rui satirizing King Li of Zhou.

Lush and tender mulberry trees, beneath whose shade is evenly spread;

If you strip their leaves, they grow sparse, harming these common people below.

Endlessly cutting off the sorrow in my heart, grief fills my breast indeed;

O bright and lofty Heaven above, do you not take pity on us?

Four sturdy stallions, strong and fierce; banners and pennants flutter and wave.

Disorder arises, never to be quelled; no state escapes calamity.

The people have no elders left; all meet disaster, turning to ash.

Alas, how truly sorrowful! The nation's fate is so distressed.

The state lacks resources; Heaven does not aid us.

No place remains to stay; where shall we go?

The noble man truly holds to right, his heart without contentious strife.

Who then gave birth to the stairway of chaos, still blocking the way today?

My anxious heart is earnest, longing for my homeland.

I am born in an unseasonable time, encountering Heaven's fierce anger.

From west to east, no settled place remains.

The hardships I meet are many; the borders are critically endangered.

Plans and counsels must be cautious, yet the state of chaos only worsens.

I tell you to be anxious and compassionate, instruct you to grant office in order.

Who can hold something hot, without using water to cool it?

How then can it be good, to sink together into the flood?

Like going against the wind, one also feels choked.

The people have reverent hearts, but their strength cannot match their will.

They delight in farming tasks, letting the people labor to replace officials' grain.

Farming is a treasure; replacing grain is a good thing.

Heaven sends down ruin and loss, destroying the kings we have established.

It sends down these pests, harming all farming until it is sick.

I grieve for the Central Kingdom, all waste like tumors.

There is no strength left, to think of High Heaven.

Only this enlightened king is what the people look up to.

He holds to his heart, proclaims his plans, carefully examines and chooses his ministers.

Only that unyielding king thinks himself good alone.

He has another heart altogether, making the people ultimately mad.

Look at the forest, where deer gather in herds.

Among friends, they slander each other, unable to treat each other well.

People also have a saying: "It is hard to advance or retreat."

Only this sage can see a hundred miles ahead.

Only that fool is instead reckless and joyful.

Is it that he cannot speak? Why is he so fearful and wary?

Only this good man neither seeks nor pursues.

Only that cruel heart instead repeatedly ponders.

The people covet chaos, preferring to suffer poison.

The great wind has a path, through an empty broad valley.

Only this good man acts as a model in his deeds.

Only that unyielding man sinks into filth in his actions.

The great wind has a path; the greedy man ruins his kind.

Hearing pleasant words, he answers; hearing remonstrance, he feigns drunkenness.

He does not use those good men, but instead makes us rebellious.

Alas, you my friends! Do I not know your conduct?

Like those flying insects, sometimes they are caught.

I have already understood you in secret; you instead come to threaten me.

The people have no standard, mainly because they delight in turning away.

Doing what harms the people, as if fearing they cannot.

The people are depraved, mainly because they compete with force.

The people are unsettled, mainly because of thieves and bandits.

I advise them it is not permissible, but instead they curse me behind my back.

Although they say it is not me, I have already made this song.

"Tender Mulberry" has sixteen stanzas: eight stanzas of eight lines each, and eight stanzas of six lines each.