Mount Liupan
(To the tune "Pure and Serene Music")
(October 1935)2
The sky is high, the clouds are pale,
We watch the wild geese flying south until they vanish.
If we reach not the Great Wall³ we are no true men,
Already we have come twenty thousand li.
High on the crest of Mount Liupan,
Banners idly wave in the west wind.
Today the long cord is in our hands,
When shall we bind fast the Gray Dragon?6


Our source for this poem, which first appeared in the January 1957 issue of Shikan, is the
Shici duilian, pp. 59-60.


1. Mount Liupan, located in Guyuan xian in the southern part of what is now the
Ningxia Autonomous Region, is the main peak in the range bearing the same name. Mao
led the Central Red Army across this peak in early October 1935.


2. The editors of the Shici duilian note, "According to the reminiscences of Comrade
Chen Changfeng and others, the author made final revisions to the text of this ci in
December 1935, in Wayaobao (now Zichang xian)."


3. Mao here evokes the destination of the Long March.


4. When the poem was first published in Shikan, this line read: "Yak-tail banners idly
wave in the west wind." Animal tails used as banners were traditional in China, especially
in the western regions, and the Tang dynasty poet Cen Shen, who by the twentieth century
was known as China's foremost "frontier poet" and to whom Mao has elsewhere made
reference, wrote a line about a general who "led a westward campaign, under the yak-tail
banner." According to the editors of the Shici duilian, in 1961 when Mao wrote out the
poem "at the request of comrades from Ningxia," he substituted "red flags" for
"yak-tail banners." (See the October 7, 1961, issue of Guangming ribao for a facsimile
of the poem in Mao's calligraphy.) Beginning with the 1963 edition of Mao zhuxi shici,
"red flags" has been used.


5. Traditional legend has it that during Han Wudi's time, an army was sent out to
Southern Yue. They asked Wudi for a long cord, promising to bind up and bring back the
king of Yue.


6. "Gray Dragon' stands for the planet Jupiter, which is considered an ill-omened,
evil force in ancient Chinese lore. Chinese commentaries on this poem state that it refers
to Chiang Kaishek, although earlier translations of the poem have indicated that it may
also stand for the Japanese invaders. The editors of the Shici duilian also state that this
line alludes to a ci to the tune "Congratulating the Bridegroom" by the Song dynasty poet
Liu Kezhuang, which contains the line, "When will the long cord come into our hands/To
bind fast the military commander?"