Birthday poem · October 30Frost’s Descent, the 18th solar term: the first frosts.
Birth character
聲 shēng · voice
聲 means sound or voice, and also reputation.
夜來風雨聲
“After one night of wind and showers” — Meng Haoran, ‘Spring Dawn’
Other dates with this poem: December 29
The poem
“A Child Playing with Ice” 稚子弄冰
- 稚子金盆脫曉冰At dawn the child lifts the ice from a golden basin,
- 彩絲穿取當銀鉦threads it on coloured silk to be a silver gong.
- 敲成玉磬穿林響Struck, it rings like a jade chime through the woods —
- 忽作玻璃碎地聲then suddenly shatters on the ground like glass.
Why this poem
Yang Wanli on a child using a disc of ice as a gong. A winter poem.
This day in the Chinese calendar
Solar term: Frost’s Descent.