On Reading the *Song of Everlasting Sorrow*

Ru Chun: When I was young and read this poem, I found it exceedingly beautiful and was moved by its deep emotion. Now, reading it again, I deeply understand my own foolishness and the absurdity of this poem. In times of peace and prosperity: "One glance back, a smile, a hundred charms are born; the beauties of the six palaces lose all color," with the favor of three thousand gathered upon her alone. When national calamity struck: "The six armies would not march—what could be done? The delicate beauty died before the horses." The beauty became the source of calamity, bearing the blame for the emperor. The hypocrisy of the sovereign: "The monarch covered his face, unable to save her." How hypocritical and fickle the love between men and women is, and how pragmatic the sovereign: to preserve his dynasty, he sacrificed his beloved, using her life to extinguish the fury of the six armies so that he himself could flee for his life.

The poet glorified this heartlessness as the profound love of an emperor, making it a masterpiece sung through the ages: "In heaven, we wish to be birds flying wing to wing; on earth, we wish to be branches intertwined." "Heaven and earth may end someday, yet this sorrow stretches on without end." If so, why did the consort die while the sovereign alone survived? Why does he not hate himself for having personally caused Consort Yang's death, but instead laments that his own deep love now has nowhere to be placed? Is this not absurd? One wonders what the poet was thinking, and whether the original intent was to use the poem to awaken people. But the whole poem, from beginning to end, serves more to mislead and to cover up the emperor's political incompetence and the ugly, true face of his heartlessness, hypocrisy, and selfishness. It attributed the political failure to Yang Yuhuan being too beautiful and too captivating—a beauty that brought calamity—as the cause of the dynasty's decline. Did the imperial consort, in the end, manage to see through the suffering and falsity of romantic love between men and women? Did she reflect on how she had grown arrogant through favoritism, greedily enjoying the splendor of a prosperous age and thus bearing today's bitter fruit? Her merit exhausted, she perished—who is to blame?

From ancient times to the present, how many men and women have indulged in and greedily enjoyed material things and romantic love, blindly throwing themselves into the flame like moths, not knowing for what—caring only for this moment's feelings, willing to endure no matter how bitter, never turning back no matter how great the price. People of the world also crave fame and achievement. This poem has been passed down for a thousand years, recited by tens of thousands, stirring people's envy and longing for romantic love. Yet romantic love between men and women is the primary cause of samsara—the more one craves and clings, the more one is bound. Who knows what kind of karma one must bear for this? It is truly terrifying to think about.

The karma of human beings determines that they will have these intense cravings and aspirations, these shallow mental capacities and emotions, and these erroneous patterns of thinking. To reverse this is extremely difficult. Sentient beings, toward these sufferings, not only do not feel weariness and wish to depart, but instead crave them deeply. The six faculties are constantly craving the six sense objects, which is tantamount to constantly craving suffering—not knowing suffering, craving suffering. How can there be liberation in this? Only great bodhisattvas can pull up this stubborn karma and reverse humanity's deeply rooted cognition and craving—it is comparable to a human genetic engineering project, and by no means easy. The more one can contemplate the sufferings of the world, the more grateful one becomes toward the Three Jewels.