WEI AN

（1960-1999）

1998: The Twenty-Four Solar Terms (Three Extracts) 

translated by Dave Haysom

Yushui (Rainwater, the Second Solar Term)

Date: Twenty-third of the First Moon (February 19th)
Time: 4:43 AM
Weather: Overcast, precipitation
Temperature: -2 to 3 degrees Celsius
Wind force: 1-2

On the ancient road of the solar terms, Yushui is an unassuming waypoint. While Lichun (Start of Spring), the first of the twenty-four terms, always seems to be accompanied by wind (the windy Beijing springtime in miniature), Yushui does not necessarily mean rain. Like a sign at the forest’s edge, Yushui serves to warn travellers: You are now entering a territory where rain may occur.

This year’s Yushui is something of a miracle. I’ve never experienced anything quite like it—this literal embodiment of the word “Yushui.” As in the winters of my childhood, I woke up in the morning to the pleasant surprise of snow outside the window, which had started in the night and by dawn was rain. Like the old saying about how tangerines grow into bitter oranges north of the Huai river, the roofs and the ground are still covered in rain-soaked snow. The drops fall into the snow as if falling down a well, in complete silence. Contributing to the magic of it all is: 1. actual rainfall on the day of Yushui; 2. such heavy snow after Lichun; 3. the rare convergence of rain and snow, symbols of two very different seasons.

Snow brings the quiet, it is said. There is no one in the fields, no footsteps in the snow. “Lichun pivots towards the warmth; Yushui is the time to spread manure.” The farming proverbs of yesteryear have lost their currency in the era of chemical fertiliser and pesticide.) The soil has vanished; the snow prompts a moment of hesitation on the path that leads to springtime and warmth. After absorbing the rain, the snow contracts underfoot, its lustre dimmed like a knife gone blunt, its edge lost. A few damp magpies rise and dip. This is the time in which they look for a place to nest among the scattered trees or metal pylons. This unseasonable snow naturally elicits thoughts of the winter just passed, but might also prompt a historian to think of modern Chinese history, the fleeting empire of Yuan Shikai.

Jingzhe (Awakening of Insects, the Third Solar Term)

Date: Eighth of the Second Moon (March 6th)
Time: 3:03 AM
Weather: Clear skies
Temperature: 2 to 14 degrees Celsius
Wind force: 2-3

We admire the solar terms for their precision, yes, their remarkable alignment with seasonable phenomena, but also for their names—names that evoke a rustic Eastern landscape or a traditional Chinese poem. They are the elegant quintessence of language, embodying the concision and expressive capacity of Chinese in a way that makes us, their linguistic descendants, feel both pride and shame.

“Jingzhe”: two characters placed together that magically animate a tableau, evoking limitless stories. You can almost see it: a distant roll of thunder awakens a throng of creatures from their slumber. Acting in instinctive harmony, they blink their bleary eyes, opening their doors towards the sage-like sun. The term is tinted with impetus, with reformation, an inversion of all that is inactive, passive, dormant. It appears like a kindly intervention, a rustic innkeeper gently shaking awake a customer who carries all his earthly burdens on his back: “Sir, wake up, dawn is here, you should be on your way.”

As if responding to the reformatory spirit of this solar term, today is bright following several days of poor weather (and not because rain has fallen or wind has blown the clouds away). The sky looks like a lake or pond hidden deep in the forest, gradations of blue that pale near the bank. The wheat is turning green; everything is green, crisp and fresh and thick, stretching out as far as the eye can see. One feels it is not just the seedlings, but the colour green itself that is alive. Grass spills over the road through the ravine, a swathe of green as eye-catching as any newspaper headline. The willows extend their buds like the tongues of birds, while the poplar buds evoke the sprouting antlers of young deer. In the fields, I notice a dozen young birds (larks, perhaps) in haphazard flight; they flit like spirits, delicate and twitchy. Their feathers are almost the colour of earth, fading from view as they dip towards the ground. I have tried looking at them through a telescope, but it’s impossible to get a clear glimpse. (Something else in the distance catches my attention: a girl dressed in red with a book in her hands, pacing back and forth along the pavement outside the new high-tech development zone). Darling youth, the vigour of new life, the glee of innocence, an air of ascent, the fence of the horizon; these fields are like a nursery beneath the sun.

“After Jingzhe, warmth is here.” Jingzhe marks the point where spring asserts its control.

Qingming (Pure Brightness, the Fifth Solar Term)

Date: Ninth of the Third Moon (April 5th)
Time: 8:06 AM
Weather: Dark 
Temperature: 8 to 17 degrees Celsius 
Wind force: 0-1

Qingming is one of the most familiar solar terms. “Everything is growing, and all is pure and bright, hence the name of Pure Brightness.” This is the original sense of the name, but Qingming’s split identity makes it unique among the solar terms: it has transcended farming and agriculture, becoming a traditional folk holiday for all of China. I will always associate Qingming with the childhood memories of paying respects at graves with my grandmother, with the exquisite melancholy of Du Mu’s poem—they constitute the foundation of everything Qingming means to me. In the future, I believe, Qingming alone will remind people of the ancient (eternal) solar terms, when they have completely forsaken nature for a digital existence.

The mystery, prestige, and longevity of the solar terms resides in their accuracy. This is what allows people to recognise the changes in the sky, the weather and seasonal phenomena, following the punctual shift from each solar term to the next. Like Lichun (Start of Spring) and Liqiu (Start of Autumn), Qingming is a delicate, conspicuous term, bringing with it a mysterious, eerie mood. Perhaps because of its conversion into a festival, the sky of Qingming often turns the exact opposite of pure brightness (making it unique among the twenty-four), preserving its inseparable connection with this season’s humanity. In my experience, Qingming tends to bring a biting wind, tenebrosity, or rain—a natural backdrop to a festival of ghosts, a link between the world of life and the world of shadows, a day when the living converse with the dead.

This year’s Qingming is a typical example. After many dark days, today saw a sudden change: the sun appeared in the sky, the kind of sun you can look straight at, that projects no shadows onto the ground. (Today the sun foregoes its radiant attire and appears incognito.) The fields are dim, thick with mist, and nothing beyond a kilometre away is visible, a sinister atmosphere spookier than night. Apart from a few locals stooping in the fields, foraging for wild herbs, there are no farmers working. The occasional monotone caw of an unseen bird intensifies the mood. Each cry is long, drawn out, as if it comes to us from the realm of ghosts. It is some kind of nocturnal bird I cannot name, whose shape I have never seen. In films, when they want to foreshadow a murder on some dark January night, this is the sound they use.

On the road back from the fields, I see a group of donkeys in the development zone, about twenty in number, with a middle-aged farmer nearby. I go over and strike up a conversation with him. He’s from Zhangbei in Hebei, and so are his donkeys. He brought them here to sell to the local restaurants. Donkeys always seem miserable, I say. Is that why farmers don’t particularly like them? Not true, he replies, farmers have a lot of affection for their donkeys, even more than for their horses. Donkeys are more durable, they work harder, they aren’t fussy eaters—they’re easy to keep. And they live longer than horses.