POEM
咏鹅Yǒng ÉOde to the Goose
- Dynasty
- Tang
- Author
- 骆宾王 Luò Bīnwáng (Luo Binwang)
- Genre
- 古体诗
- Lines
- 4
- Era
- c. 7th century
THE POEM — LINE BY LINE
Tap a line for word-by-word gloss.
#1鹅，鹅，鹅É é éGoose, goose, goose! — an excited child pointing at the pond.word by word
鹅égoose鹅égoose鹅égoose#2曲项向天歌Qū xiàng xiàng tiān gēIts curved neck raised, it sings to the sky.word by word
#3白毛浮绿水Bái máo fú lǜ shuǐWhite feathers float on the green water,word by word
#4红掌拨清波Hóng zhǎng bō qīng bōand red webbed feet paddle through the clear ripples.word by word
POEM IN PLAIN ENGLISH
A plain-English guide, not a literary translationGoose, goose, goose! With its curved neck raised, it sings to the sky; its white feathers float on the green water, and its red webbed feet paddle through the clear ripples. Every line is a clean stroke of color and shape — white, green, red — as seen by a very young child at the edge of a pond. This is a plain-English guide, not a literary translation.
BACKGROUND & IMAGERY
Luo Binwang (c. 640-684) was one of the 'Four Masters of the Early Tang'. Legend says he wrote 咏鹅 at age seven when a guest challenged him to compose on the geese in the family pond — making the poem a double childhood classic: written by a child, and read by every Chinese child since. With its first line of three repeated characters and its simple color contrast, it is traditionally the first poem in the first-grade textbook.
TRUST & SOURCES
- Reviewed by
- AI-assisted editorial review
- Last reviewed
- 2026-08-15
Sources
- 《全唐诗》（中华书局点校本）通行文本；部编版语文教材同文
- 本站飞花令语料 feihualing.db（poem 356894） — 文本以通行本为准，库本仅行级参考（库本与通行本一致）；库中另有首句分行排印的三行本（poem 308503），不予采用
- Original English paraphrase & gloss — 本站原创学习释义，非文学译本（plain-English guide, not a literary translation）
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