相思
hóng dòu红豆shēng生nā南guó国，
chūn春lái来fā发jī几zhī枝。
yuàn愿jūn君duō cǎi多采xié撷，
cǐ此wù物zuì最xiāng sī相思。
Line by line
- 红豆生南国，紅豆生南國， Red beans grow in the southern land;
- 春来发几枝。春來發幾枝。 how many sprigs will spring bring out?
- 愿君多采撷，願君多採擷， Gather a good many, I beg you —
- 此物最相思。 nothing speaks of longing like these.
The poet & the story
Wang Wei (701–761) was a painter, musician and devout Buddhist as well as a poet — Su Shi said his poems contained paintings and his paintings poems. This quatrain was written for a friend, the musician Li Guinian, and became one of the most-set-to-music poems of the Tang.
Interpretation
Red beans grow in the south; how many sprays will they put out this spring? Gather plenty, the poet tells his distant friend — this thing is the very stuff of longing. The red bean (相思豆, “longing bean”) has carried that meaning ever since: the poem turned a plant into a national symbol of missing someone.