DavidA bed of spring leeks is green. The meaning of these two poems is: beds of leeks grow green in the spring wind, and patches of rice fields are overflowing with the fragrance of pollen.
This sentence comes from Lingxing goose water in a dream of Red Mansions by Cao Xueqin of the Qing Dynasty. The original text: Apricot curtain invites guests to drink. There is a villa in sight. Ling Xing goose water, sang Yu swallow beam. A bed of spring leeks is green and ten miles of rice flowers are fragrant. There is no need to plough and weave in a prosperous age.
Full text translation:
The yellow wine flag attracted the guests to drink in front. From a distance, there was a faint villa. There are innocent geese playing among Lingye and xingcai, and flying swallows shuttling through mulberry elms. Rows of leeks grow green in the spring breeze, and patches of rice fields are overflowing with the fragrance of pollen. In the prosperous age of Kaiming, there was no famine and cold discouragement, so why rush for farming and weaving all day!
Ling Xing Er Shui is a five character poem written by Lin Daiyu on behalf of Jia Baoyu. The first couplet of this poem begins with "apricot curtain" in the first sentence and "in sight" in the next sentence. It skillfully includes the title and depicts the prospect of the villa. The two in the middle fought against each other. The Chinese couplet uses nouns instead of verbs, and combines several images to form a lively farm map. The neck couplet uses the normal word order to read fluently and catchy. In particular, the tail couplet can reflect Daiyu's intelligence.
