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Tang Dynasty Jueju Liu Zongyuan

Viewing Mountains with the Monk Haochu

與浩初上人同看山寄京華親故

Yǔ Hàochū shàng rén tóng kàn shān jì jīng huá qīn gù

Sharp coastal mountains bring thoughts of distant home. Read the startling wish to turn one body into many figures watching from separate peaks.

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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.

01

海畔尖山似劍鋩，

hǎi pàn jiān shān sì jiàn máng

Near the sea, sharp mountains look like sword points;

Word meanings — Line 1
  1. 海 hǎi sea
  2. 畔 pàn edge
  3. 尖 jiān pointed
  4. 山 shān mountains
  5. 似 sì like
  6. 劍 jiàn sword
  7. 鋩 máng point
02

秋來處處割愁腸。

qiū lái chù chù gē chóu cháng

with autumn, everywhere they cut my grieving heart.

Word meanings — Line 2
  1. 秋 qiū autumn
  2. 來 lái comes
  3. 處 chù everywhere
  4. 處 chù everywhere
  5. 割 gē cut
  6. 愁 chóu sorrow
  7. 腸 cháng gut
03

若為化得身千億，

ruò wéi huà dé shēn qiān yì

If only I could turn this body into countless selves,

Word meanings — Line 3
  1. 若 ruò how
  2. 為 wéi can
  3. 化 huà transform
  4. 得 dé achieve
  5. 身 shēn body
  6. 千 qiān thousand
  7. 億 yì hundred million
04

散上峰頭望故鄉。

sàn shàng fēng tóu wàng gù xiāng

scattered on the summits, all looking toward home.

Word meanings — Line 4
  1. 散 sàn scatter
  2. 上 shàng onto
  3. 峰 fēng peak
  4. 頭 tóu top
  5. 望 wàng gaze
  6. 故 gù old
  7. 鄉 xiāng home

English translation by PoemWell.

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Original

海畔尖山似劍鋩，

秋來處處割愁腸。

若為化得身千億，

散上峰頭望故鄉。

Translation

Near the sea, sharp mountains look like sword points;

with autumn, everywhere they cut my grieving heart.

If only I could turn this body into countless selves,

scattered on the summits, all looking toward home.

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.

  1. Line 1 · What does the marked word mean?

    海畔尖山似劍鋩，

    Pronunciation hint

    shān

    Reveal meaning and translation

    山 — mountains

    Near the sea, sharp mountains look like sword points;

  2. Line 3 · What does the marked word mean?

    若為化得身千億，

    Pronunciation hint

    dé

    Reveal meaning and translation

    得 — achieve

    If only I could turn this body into countless selves,

  3. Line 4 · What does the marked word mean?

    散上峰頭望故鄉。

    Pronunciation hint

    tóu

    Reveal meaning and translation

    頭 — top

    scattered on the summits, all looking toward home.

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 →

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Line-by-line notes

Lines 1–2 · The shape becomes a wound

尖 and 鋩 both draw attention to a point. The mountains resemble the tips of blades in the first line, and 割 lets that resemblance act on the speaker in the second. 愁腸 places grief inside the body. The English uses “grieving heart” for that idiom while keeping the verb “cut.” The selected source normalizes 劒 to 劍.

Lines 3–4 · How many places can one person look from?

若為 introduces a wish cast as a question about how such a change could happen. 身 is one body, while 千億 opens up an incalculable number of selves. The edition’s 散上 makes those selves scatter upward onto the peaks. 散作 is the recorded variant. All the different positions end in one act, 望, looking toward home. The title addresses relatives and old friends in the capital, which gives the otherwise invisible destination a human direction.

Form and tone

The seven-character quatrain divides between a painful comparison and a fantastic wish. The last two lines extend a single conditional thought. 千億 is emphatic multiplicity, not an exact headcount. The repeated looking gives the final image both scale and a single emotional direction.

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

Haochu is named as a Buddhist monk through the respectful 上人. The title records shared mountain viewing and a message northward; the lines themselves concentrate on homesickness. They do not tell us that the companion endorses the speaker’s imagined transformation.

Continue with Liu Zongyuan and the homesickness reading path. Compare Quiet Night Thought and Banyan Leaves Fall in Liuzhou using the reading connections below.

Sources

與浩初上人同看山寄京華親故 — Chinese text. Checked against the linked Wikisource transcription. The source graph 劒 is normalized to 劍; the main reading 散上 is retained rather than the noted variant 散作. 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

Liu Zongyuan. “Viewing Mountains with the Monk Haochu” (與浩初上人同看山寄京華親故). PoemWell. English translation by PoemWell. Updated .

https://poemwell.org/poems/viewing-mountains-with-haochu

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.