It's raining in the south and snowing in the north
Author: 荷衣蕙带 Reposted from: Banyan Tree Starfire Society
Author: 寒煙若水
荷衣语：Who says that young cyberliterature can only linger on love, decadence and sex? Look, the pen of the daughter of Ruohua can still shake the style of the great prose of culture! Tonight, I read a few beautiful articles in a row, but I feel that my cheeks are clear, and my teeth are full of flavor. I can't say anything, but I just want to sigh a few times: good article! Good article! Good article!!!
In the middle of the yellowed paper of the history books, I often hear some subtle and sharp gasps, cutting through the thousand years of changing time and space, clearly shaking the ripples of the air. Those who went south to the shishi said in wistful voices, go to the north, go to the north.
The Xianbei rode their high horses and easily broke through the gates of Luoyang, where there were no peonies in full bloom, only the green-gray walls stood all alone in the setting sun, suffused with a bleak vitality, and people's frightened eyes gradually thinned to indifference, and no one remembered the flocks of migratory birds high in the sky, and the haste of the last emperor of the Western Jin Dynasty many years ago when he was confronted with the iron cavalry of the Xiong Nu. A snowstorm is brewing in the cloudy sky, who is praying for the emperor's auspiciousness, and who is looking forward to the moistness of melting snow in the coming year.
The Eastern Jin dynasty was huddled south of the Yangtze River, and was the richness of the south of the river slowly and unconsciously worn out go back to the north, back to Luoyang, back to the sharpness of Changan. Autumn rain began to create a lingering atmosphere, the long sleeves of the dancers rolled over the candlelight, gorgeous veil swaying, even the air with the willow-like waist soft down, the drunken Sima family to the sound of the rain as the beat, chanting the colorful court music.
When I was very young, I used to recite several poems by Du Mu. I read in my tender childish voice, "Four hundred and eighty temples in the south, how many buildings in the smoky rain. The merchants' daughters do not know the hatred of their country, and they still sing of the flowers in the backyard across the river. At that time, I could not understand the poets' message of sadness, I just ignorantly read, recite, and then remember the taste of the mouth full of these lingering poems. The sheer charm of the language threw me from one reverie to another, and the imagery of those rainy and snowy days formed my first conception of the South and the North.
They have, always, been so different.
I live in a small town sandwiched between the south and the north, with low mountains to its north and flat fertile fields to its south. It's a city desperately lacking in imagination, with its gray faces, and its pallid skies. But it is also a city that never fails to fill one with a quest for history, and it holds a barrage of thoughts. Chu jian, the emperor's tomb, and stories buried deep underground. It is different from all the characteristics of the South and the North, and it has both the meaning of the South and the North at the same time. I live here awkwardly, and day after day I hear the firm and then fading voices in those pages. Go north, go north.
Sometimes I realize that it's just a game of thought, that all the silence and imagination is for some lofty dream. I fantasize in spring about the beauty of the grass and flowers in Jiangnan, and I miss the bright snow that falls on the Qinling Mountains in the cold winter days. The train crosses one mountain after another, and the breath of the Yellow River is drowned out by the whistle. The life on the Loess Plateau is awe-inspiring, the green pulling itself out of the vastness, flourishing, and then dying in order to fulfill the process of another life. I gazed longingly at the city of Xi'an, the wind carrying the scent of lamb kebabs, and everything felt otherworldly and unreal. However, I must believe that this is the north, the heart of the Central Plains in history books, the battlefield of the war of gold, iron and horses. Although the prosperity is over, only the vicissitudes of the old days remain.
Sometimes I deliberately listen to the weather forecast, the symbols of rain and snow that meander across the map, the fall and winter in the north are always cold, while the warmth of the south makes people reluctant to leave.
In the eyes of many literati, the south and north of China are not just a geographical and political-historical disparity, but they carry the imprint of a distinct culture. The rugged north is swarthy, nurtured by cold and snow, while the delicate south is tender, nourished by warmth and continuous rain.
In 1276, the parochial Southern Song dynasty was destroyed by the Yuan.
I am still tirelessly memorizing history books, and this was the end of southern China as a capital city in ancient times. The Southern Song failed to make it back to the Central Plains, and instead took its final journey through the hazy rain and mist of the South, just as the Eastern Jin Dynasty did many years ago.
It rained in the south and snowed in the north.
History leaves us with countless sighs and hopes in a single turn.
What we are clinging to is but a battle between dreams and results, between giving up and holding on. And time will give everything a fair judgment.