A Game of Poems: Sikong Tu, Act 1

In the late Tang, there was once a young man from a small town called Yuxiang 虞乡 who specialized in doing nothing. Though he came from a family of minor officials, he did not even try taking the examinations until was thirty-three years old, in 869.

In my youth I used to waste my life,
The time pushed me hard, but I was always at leisure.

Nobody knows what Sikong Tu was doing in the years before 869, but he probably spent a good deal of his time in the Zhongtiao mountains, a place of Buddhist institutes where students and scholars gathered for study and teaching. Tu took the public examinations the same year his patron, Wang Ning 王凝, became the Chief Examiner. When he ranked fourth out of thousands of candidates, disgruntled young men said Tu only succeeded because Wang Ning helped -- but Wang Ning actually opposed corruption in the government, and his crackdown on favoritism cost him his own job the following year. Wang Ning's enemy, Wei Paoheng, married the daughter of Emperor Yizong 唐懿宗 -- that was how Paoheng gained the influence to retaliate against Wang Ning. Purged from the capital, Wang Ning was assigned to a series of minor posts in different outlying locations until his death in 877. Tu stayed with Wang Ning till the latter's death in the South, gaining experience as an exile that would mark his poetry:

The sun brings with it the roaring of the tide to the evening.
The smoke is soaked with the color of trees in the autumn.

From ancient times, the worthies and the talented have been tragic and sorrowful.
Everlastingly the powerful families controlled the important positions.
Henceforth I will get myself drunk whenever I hear a song,
And live as an idler without helping the world.

But such lines belie Tu's devotion to Wang Ning, who was fighting the rebels Huang Chao 黄巢 and Wang Xianzhi when he died. After Wang's death, Tu answer a summons to the capital for a new assignment, but as punishment for tardiness he was demoted and sent to Luoyang, the less important Eastern Capital. This city was a gathering place for all the men of talent currently out of power -- Lu Xi, one such official, came to admire Tu's character. When Lu Xi was summoned back to the capital a year later to head the Department of War, he shared his good fortune with Tu. By 879, Lu Xi was a Chief Minister and Tu was given a post in the Ministry of Rites. While in the capital, he lived in Chongyi Ward, two blocks from the palace; he was soon promoted, and even earned the purple-fish-bag (feiyudai) for meritorious service. But in the winter of early 881, the Tang capital of Chang'an was under attack; Wang Xianzhi was dead, but the rebel Huang Chao pressed on. On January 4, rebel forces took the Tongguan pass, the capital cities last defense. Eunuchs made accusations; officials committed suicide. Emperor Xizong fled in secret to a provisional capital set up at Chengdu, leaving most of the government and royal family behind. Rebels entered on January 8. Panic ensued.

Sikong Tu hid in a friends house in the gentry neighborhood of Chongyi Ward. He was just about to leave for Changpinglin, a government store-house of salt and iron, rebel soldiers burst in; one soldier blocked the door with a great spear. He stared at Sikong Tu. Then, he approached and took Sikong's hands. "I am Duan Zhang 段章, your former servant." Duan Zhang explained that he had been captured and forced to join the rebels, but now knew that Heaven had arranged events so that he, Duan, could save Tu's life in repayment for Tu's kindness. He suggested that Tu seek parlay with Duan's commander, General Zhang, who respected scholars. No! Tu would rather die than surrender and be disgraced. Moved by his decision, Duan lead Tu to the road, and escape.

Tu slipped out of the city through the Kaiyuan Gate under the cover of darkness, heading east. When he reached Xianyang Bridge, a boatman named Han Jun took him south, to Huxian. From Huxian, we lose track...

Paraphrasing Wong Yoon Wah, Ssu-K'ung T'u: A Poet-Critic of the T'ang, pp. 7-18