Chapter 1 Part 7

The saying goes: ‘Unwanted items will be caught from casting a hook and line when travelling slowly down a river.’ So what was the scene that day? A poem puts it thus:

The King’s carriage left his glorious city
The bright flags leaving trails of colour.
As the cortege passed
Flowers bloomed along the roadside
If one wanted to know what this meant
He soon would come to realise that his King was out
And he would come to greet him.

Thus, as the King left Chaoge, he was greeted by whole families, lighting incense, or placing their petitions forward to him, or laying down carpets or colours. Protected by the Wucheng King Huang Feihu, The Yellow Flying Tiger, accompanied by the literati and the martial officers, the King passed three thousand iron mounts and eight hundred imperial forests.

The King finally arrived at the Temple of Nuwa. He left his chariot, entered the Temple, lit some incense in an incense burner, and began to pray, his cortege following his every move. The King noted how grand the Temple was; how did he see it?

‘He saw the Temple in its grand glory – colourful, and gilded with gold.
Whilst the Gold Boy stared at the curtains
The Jade Girl clasped her hands together in greeting.
A crescent moon hung at a sloping angle;
He next saw the phases of the moon, from waxing to waning, hung over the ceiling
Folded, wrinkled silk curtains hung from the ceiling to the floor
And faced tens of thousands of duelling birds.
The side of the Bed of the Goddess
Was surrounded by dancing cranes.
The heavy perfume of incense sunk towards the Goddess’s Throne
Which faced walking dragons and flying phoenixes.
Such floaty, strange sights were rare indeed!
The golden stove released auspicious clouds, a floaty, purple mist
And the silver candles shone brightly.
And as the King was gazing at the rich sight
A powerful gust of wind, so cold that it reached a man’s innards, began to stir.

The King was looking at the Goddess’s Temple, noting its perfect symmetry and sumptuous decoration, when a powerful, powerful gust of wind blew in; the wind lifted the curtains, revealing the statue of the Goddess Nuwa. The face on that statue was of an unearthly beauty, and the complexion blooming; it was as though an immortal, or the Goddess of the Moon, were present.

There is an old proverb that goes like this: ‘Just as the rise of countries must involve some degree of luck, the fall of countries must involve a degree of black magic.’ Now the King saw the statue, and was shaken by it, but shaken with lust, and he thought, ‘We are the King, the Son of Heaven; we own the four seas, six courts, three palaces, and yet we have not seen such beauty as this!’ And he commanded his courtiers to bring him some writing implements, which they did, and in a fit, the King wrote this poem on the chalk walls of the Temple: