Autumn Evening
秋夕
Qiū xī
A small fan, fireflies, and distant stars fill a cold palace evening. Read how quiet gestures suggest longing without giving the watcher a spoken complaint.
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Read the original and its translation together. Open a line’s word meanings for a closer look.
About the text and pronunciation
The simplified view changes character forms, not the edition. Notes and sources retain the cited text.
The Chinese source is shown in traditional characters by default, with a simplified view available. Pinyin is modern standard Mandarin, a reading aid, not Tang or Song pronunciation.
Word by word, in the order of the line. A gloss is a crib. It is not the translation.
Word meanings — Line 1
- 銀 yín silver
- 燭 zhú lamp
- 秋 qiū autumn
- 光 guāng light
- 冷 lěng cold
- 畫 huà painted
- 屏 píng screen
Word meanings — Line 2
- 輕 qīng light
- 羅 luó gauze
- 小 xiǎo small
- 扇 shàn fan
- 撲 pū swats
- 流 liú drifting
- 螢 yíng fireflies
Word meanings — Line 3
- 天 tiān palace
- 階 jiē steps
- 夜 yè night
- 色 sè scene
- 涼 liáng cool
- 如 rú like
- 水 shuǐ water
Word meanings — Line 4
- 臥 wò lie
- 看 kàn watch
- 牽 qiān leading
- 牛 niú ox
- 織 zhī weaving
- 女 nǚ woman
- 星 xīng stars
English translation by PoemWell.
Read the whole poem
Original
銀燭秋光冷畫屏，
輕羅小扇撲流螢。
天階夜色涼如水，
臥看牽牛織女星。
Translation
A pale candle's autumn light chills the painted screen;
a small gauze fan flicks at passing fireflies.
Night on the palace steps is cool as water;
lying there, she watches the Cowherd and Weaver stars.
Try it from memory
After reading, recall the underlined word or phrase in each line. Say its meaning before opening the answer. These prompts use the text edition printed above.
-
Line 1 · What does the marked word mean?
銀燭秋光冷畫屏，
Pronunciation hint
guāng
Reveal meaning and translation
光 — light
A pale candle's autumn light chills the painted screen;
-
Line 3 · What does the marked word mean?
天階夜色涼如水，
Pronunciation hint
sè
Reveal meaning and translation
色 — scene
Night on the palace steps is cool as water;
-
Line 4 · What does the marked word mean?
臥看牽牛織女星。
Pronunciation hint
niú
Reveal meaning and translation
牛 — ox
lying there, she watches the Cowherd and Weaver stars.
One more question: what changes?
Compare the opening and closing lines. What changes in the scene, the speaker’s attention, or the feeling? Choose a Chinese word as evidence, then compare your reading with the notes. More than one answer may be reasonable.
Line-by-line notes →Self-check at your own pace. No score or progress is saved. Open only the answers you want included when printing.
Line-by-line notes
Lines 1–2: a small light and a small action
冷 makes the candlelight seem to chill the painted screen. The first line thus puts autumn’s temperature into a color and a surface. 輕羅 gives the fan its light silk, 小 its size. 撲 is a flick or strike toward the passing fireflies, a brief movement against the held view of the screen. The poem leaves the purpose of the action open.
Lines 3–4: from the steps to the stars
涼如水 carries the chill outside into a simile. 天階 places the scene on palace steps in this reading, and 臥看 supplies a reclining watcher. The source also gives 天街 and 坐看, which would change the place or posture. The English “she” follows the conventional reading of a woman at court. The Chinese leaves the subject unnamed. 牽牛 and 織女 name the Cowherd and Weaver stars. Their association gives the final gaze emotional scope without specifying a lover or a ruler.
Form and tone
Four seven-character lines pass through lamplight, a small movement, coldness, and sustained looking. 冷 and 涼 repeat the felt temperature. The final named stars create an emotional association rather than a narrative resolution; the watcher remains where she is.
See jueju for the larger formal pattern. Pinyin gives modern Mandarin pronunciation; a historical level/oblique grid is not inferred from those modern tones.
Historical context
This is a palace-lament scene in the received Du Mu corpus. Its interior screen and exterior steps can be followed as a sequence of images without reconstructing a floor plan. The notes distinguish the selected readings because posture and setting materially change when variants are substituted.
Continue with Du Mu and the love reading path. Compare Lament of the Jade Zither and Chang’e using the reading connections below.
Sources
秋夕 (杜牧) — Chinese text. Checked against the linked Wikisource transcription. Main readings 銀燭, 天階, and 臥看 are retained; the source also records 紅燭, 天街, and 坐看 among its variants. Punctuation and line breaks are editorial. Translation, glosses, and reading notes are original to PoemWell.
English translation, gloss, and notes by PoemWell. The translation is original to this site.
The Chinese source is shown in traditional characters by default, with a simplified view available. Pinyin is modern standard Mandarin, a reading aid, not Tang or Song pronunciation.
Updated .
Cite this reading
Du Mu. “Autumn Evening” (秋夕). PoemWell. English translation by PoemWell. Updated .
https://poemwell.org/poems/autumn-evening-du-mu
Credit the poet for the Chinese original and PoemWell for this translation and commentary. Use the permanent page link above; source editions are listed separately.