But Why Does She Suffer So?

Without healing, emotional trauma
like a festering sore ...
can flow like a maddening river,
and bring sadness and suffering
to almost anything you do.

In a poem that may recount
such sadness and sorrow,
Li Yu writes,

Beneath the moon and
before the steps
all the oriental cherry blossoms
have fallen.

But surrounded by smoke,
she looks sorrowful as she lies upon her bed.

She feels the same regret today
as she did one long year before.

Both braids now lie
like a cloud in disarray.
And her face is wan and sallow.

Yet her crimson corset is wet
from wiping tears ....
but why does she suffer so?

She lies ...
in a drunken dream ...
just before the window.

Like a survivor who remembers a horrible tragic event, perhaps no amount of alcohol can dull this awful pain.

In retrospect, this poem may be the result of Li Yu's personal sorrow, or the pain he must have experienced as he felt the pain of others.

Not only was Li Yu deposed from his position and his place, .... he surely witnessed the tragedies of many of the people who he held dear.

Perhaps none of these tragedies were greater than the suffering of Zhou Wei, his second wife. It is said that she was raped by the Song emperor Zhao Guangyi, after invading soldiers conquered the Southern Tang a few short years before.

It is therefore not surprising that much of Li Yu's work has a deep melancholic tone.

He, like other people who have witnessed horrific events, may convey feelings of helplessness, resignation and remorse. Perhaps these morbid feelings come from a valiant soul that has since been crushed.

To his credit however, his poetry often has a philosophical edge. He begins to wonder ... just why men must suffer so.

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