Humour, realism, reverie

Du Fu fails to keep a lid on his humanity

The Wind Destroys my Cottage Roof
Du Fu

September skies stand high, but mad winds roar. 
They strip my hut of half its thatching straw, 
Which vaults the stream and spreads along the shore. 
The treetop branches snag the tufts that soar, 
The low tufts spiral to the river floor. 

The village kids from Southside know I’m past my best. 
Those miscreants didn’t even hide their theft, 
They grabbed my straw and fled through bamboo groves. 
I cursed till dry lips cracked, but none was left, 
So with my cane I puffed back home bereft. 

Much later, stillness. Clouds took on the tint  
Of ink. The autumn sky turned indistinct. 

Long years have left this blanket cold like steel. 
My son’s foot ripped it in his restless dreams. 
From bed to skylight, not one spot is dry, 
The raindrops form unbroken thready streams. 
Since An’s rebellion, I've had little sleep,  
Now, drenched, how far away the morning seems. 

I want a million rooms in one great hall, 
A joyful home for gentlemen, however poor,  
A sturdy shelter when the hard rains fall. 
Just imagine! 
If I could glimpse that hall just once and see its towers ascend, 
To freeze to death in a broken hut would be a happy end. 

杜甫  茅屋为秋风所破歌
八月秋高风怒号，卷我屋上三重茅。
茅飞渡江洒江郊，高者挂罥长林梢，下者飘转沉塘坳。
南村群童欺我老无力，忍能对面为盗贼。
公然抱茅入竹去，唇焦口燥呼不得，归来倚杖自叹息。
俄顷风定云墨色，秋天漠漠向昏黑。
布衾多年冷似铁，娇儿恶卧踏里裂。
床头屋漏无干处，雨脚如麻未断绝。
自经丧乱少睡眠，长夜沾湿何由彻！
安得广厦千万间，大庇天下寒士俱欢颜，风雨不动安如山。
呜呼！何时眼前突兀见此屋，吾庐独破受冻死亦足！

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This poem makes no sense. I hope for you it’s as transformative as it was for me. It was like looking at Jonathan Swift for the first time and realising that people in the past were just as weird as they are now.

This starts as a sonic experiment: the first five lines rhyme, with a rhyme that is today read as “ow,” and probably sounded fairly similar 1,300 years ago. It’s the howling of the wind. The poem then turns to self-mockery, then to grim realism, then to fantastical reverie, without ever pausing, or signalling what the poet wants to do. This feels like a poet who’s given up on convention and rules. He’s just communicating, desperately, because that’s his function in life.