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唐 Tang · 诗 Poem

当涂赵炎少府粉图山水歌

Song of the Powder-Painting of Landscape for Zhao Yan, District Defender of Dangtu

李白

Li Bai

唐诗Tang poetry 题画诗poem on a painting 山水landscape 李白Li Bai 歌行gexing ballad

峨眉高出西极天，罗浮直与南溟连。
名公绎思挥彩笔，驱山走海置眼前。
满堂空翠如可扫，赤城霞气苍梧烟。
洞庭潇湘意渺绵，三江七泽情洄沿。
惊涛汹涌向何处，孤舟一去迷归年。
征帆不动亦不旋，飘如随风落天边。
心摇目断兴难尽，几时可到三山巅。
西峰峥嵘喷流泉，横石蹙水波潺湲。
东厓合沓蔽轻雾，深林杂树空芊绵。
此中冥昧失昼夜，隐几寂听无鸣蝉。
长松之下列羽客，对坐不语南昌仙。
南昌仙人赵夫子，妙年历落青云士。
讼庭无事罗众宾，杳然如在丹青里。
五色粉图安足珍，真仙可以全吾身。
若待功成拂衣去，武陵桃花笑杀人。

Mount Emei towers past the sky of the farthest west; Mount Luofu runs straight down to join the Southern Deep.
The master, deep in thought, wields his painted brush, driving mountains and seas to be set before our eyes.
The hall brims with hovering green as if it could be swept; rosy haze of Chicheng, mist of Cangwu.
Dongting and Xiaoxiang drift vague and endless; the Three Rivers and Seven Marshes wind round with feeling.
Surging breakers rush on—toward where? A lone boat once gone forgets the year of its return.
The traveling sail neither stirs nor turns, drifting as though wind-blown to fall at heaven's edge.
My heart reels, my straining gaze cannot exhaust the joy—when could I ever reach the peaks of the Three Isles?
The western peak, craggy and tall, spouts rushing springs; crossed rocks pinch the water into murmuring ripples.
The eastern cliffs, folded mass on mass, are veiled in light mist; deep woods and tangled trees stretch lush without end.
Within this dim realm day and night are lost; leaning at rest in silence, not even a cicada sings.
Beneath the tall pines sit ranged the feathered adepts, facing each other wordless—the immortal of Nanchang.
The immortal of Nanchang, Master Zhao, in his finest years a free-spirited scholar of the azure clouds.
His court of justice idle, he gathers his many guests, lost afar as if within the painting itself.
Why prize a five-colored powder picture? A true immortal can make me whole.
But were I to wait till deeds were done to shake my sleeve and go, the peach blossoms of Wuling would laugh me to death.

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Meaning

The poem celebrates a colored landscape painting hung by Zhao Yan, district defender of Dangtu, and asks Li Bai for an inscription. Li Bai transforms the flat painting into living mountains and seas—driving them before the viewer's eyes, wandering through dusk and mist and immortal adepts. In the end he reflects on reclusion: a mere painting is not worth prizing, but if one waits until worldly success before withdrawing, the peach blossoms of the Peach Blossom Land will laugh at one's lateness.

赵炎运思深远，挥动彩笔，仿佛将千山万海驱赶召唤，尽数安置在观者眼前。若是等到功业成就才拂衣归隐，那时武陵的桃花怕要笑人来得迟了。

Appreciation

The poem's most remarkable feat is turning static painting into flowing time and space—a living landscape. It opens by pairing Mount Emei of Shu with Mount Luofu of the far south, so that a few feet of pigment embrace ten thousand li of rivers and mountains in a cinematic montage. Verbs like 'driving' and 'herding' endow the frozen image with motion, while sweepable 'empty green', rosy mists, surging waves and murmuring springs overlap sight, touch and hearing until the reader stands inside the scene. The closing couplet uses playful irony to expose the lifelong conflict between ambition and withdrawal, giving the bold romantic sweep a late-life chill of desolation.

【白话串讲】李白为当涂赵炎厅堂的山水壁画写诗：“峨眉高出西极天，罗浮直与南溟连”。“名公绎思挥彩笔，驱山走海置眼前”——“满堂空翠如可扫”——“惊涛汹涌向何处，孤舟一去迷归年”——他写壁画的壮阔。【意象与手法】化静为动，「驱山走海」赋丹青以生命，空翠可扫、色彩斑斓，气韵磅礴。【情感与主旨】题画而不滞于画，借卧游寄身世之感与功成身退的两难，豪情中自有暮年苍凉。【名句点睛】「若待功成拂衣去，武陵桃花笑杀人」最俏——以诙谐反语道尽一生出处矛盾，余味悠长。

Background

This poem was written around 761 CE, when the elderly Li Bai was sojourning in Dangtu and relying on his kinsman Li Yangbing. Zhao Yan, the district defender (shaofu) of Dangtu, was a lover of painting who hung a colored landscape 'powder painting' in his hall and asked Li Bai to inscribe it. Though politically frustrated at this time—implicated in Prince Yong's rebellion, exiled to Yelang, then pardoned—Li Bai's heroic spirit was undiminished, and viewing the painting he poured his pent-up grandeur into the scene on the wall. The work transcends static description, turning the painted realm into real mountains and waters one might roam and dwell in, reflecting the High Tang ideal of 'recumbent travel' while hinting at the poet's weariness with the bonds of fame and his longing for reclusion. Its closing couplet distills the contradiction between office and retirement that ran through Li Bai's whole life. The poem also testifies to the Tang view of painting as an art kindred to poetry, anticipating the Song notion that poetry and painting follow one law.

此诗约作于唐肃宗上元二年（七六一年）前后，时李白晚年流寓当涂，依附族叔李阳冰。赵炎为当涂县尉（少府），雅好丹青，于厅事张挂一幅彩色山水粉图，请李白题咏。李白一生酷爱山水，早年仗剑去国，遍历蜀中、江汉、吴越，晚年更以当涂为中心盘桓。据郁贤皓《李白丛考》考证，此期李白虽政治失意、投闲置散，然豪情未减，观画而神游，借粉壁之景发胸中之奇。值得注意的是，此作属「题画诗」一脉，却突破静态描摹，将画境化为可游可居之真山水，折射出盛唐士人「卧游」「澄怀观道」的审美理想，亦暗含诗人对功名羁绊的厌倦与归隐之思。安史乱后，唐室衰微，李白入永王李璘幕府而获罪，长流夜郎遇赦，暮年漂泊，此诗「若待功成拂衣去，武陵桃花笑杀人」之句，正是其一生出处矛盾之缩影。王琦《李太白文集辑注》于此诗系年虽未确指，然以地理与交游推之，当在当涂时期可信。诗以「粉图」为题，足见唐人已将绘画视为与诗相通之艺术，可证张彦远《历代名画记》所记盛唐绘画之盛。据《宣和书谱》载李白草书入神品，其题画之作每以书画笔法为诗法，正开宋人「诗画本一律」之先声。辛文房《唐才子传》记其晚年「浪迹江湖，终日沉饮」，依当涂令李阳冰以终，故诗中豪情与苍凉并存。今人更指出，此篇空间叙事遥承《楚辞·招魂》之铺陈，以卧游写归隐，在题画诗流变中具枢纽意义，宜与杜甫题画诸作对读以观盛唐两种题画范式之分。

Art

The poem's most extraordinary achievement is converting flat painting into a flowing time-space of 'living landscape'. First, spatial transposition: the opening couplet sets Mount Emei of Shu against Mount Luofu of Lingnan, so a few feet of powder-and-color hold ten thousand li of rivers and mountains, breaking the frame's limits in a cinematic montage. Second, animating the static: 'the master, deep in thought, wields his painted brush, driving mountains and seas to be set before our eyes', and the sail that 'neither stirs nor turns, drifting as though wind-blown to heaven's edge', give the frozen image the momentum of marching mountains and a drifting lone boat—the four words 'driving mountains, herding seas' breathe life into pigment. Third, sensory interplay: the sweepable empty green of the hall, Chicheng's sunset glow, Cangwu's haze, surging waves and murmuring springs layer vision, touch and hearing until the viewer seems present. Fourth, an architecture that moves from scene to person to principle: after the marvels of the painted realm and the wordless adepts in the middle, the poem turns to Zhao Yan himself and closes on 'a true immortal can make me whole' and the laughing peach blossoms of Wuling, three registers flowing like cloud and water. Fifth, the color language is intense—empty green, sunset glow, mist, the five-colored powder picture—typical of Li Bai's bold, untrammeled romantic manner. In rhetoric, function words such as 'as if' quicken the still scene ('the empty green seems almost sweepable' turns vision into touch), a synaesthesia a step beyond the mere copying of Six Dynasties poems on paintings; and prose-like clauses of varying length keep the ballad from slipping into slickness, showing the labor behind Li Bai's apparent ease.

此诗艺术上最卓异处，在于将平面绘画转化为流动时空的「活山水」。其一，空间腾挪之法：起笔「峨眉高出西极天，罗浮直与南溟连」，以蜀中峨眉与岭南罗浮对举，咫尺粉图而纳万里河山，运用电影般之蒙太奇剪接，打破画幅局限。其二，化静为动之笔：「名公绎思挥彩笔，驱山走海置眼前」「征帆不动亦不旋，飘如随风落天边」，本为凝固之画，诗人却写出山海奔走、孤舟飘落之动势，所谓「驱山走海」四字，赋予丹青以生命。其三，感官通联：满堂空翠可扫、赤城霞气、苍梧烟霭、惊涛汹涌、流泉潺湲，视觉、触觉、听觉交叠，使观者如临其境。其四，由景及人、由画及理的章法：前半极写画境之奇，中幅铺陈昼夜冥昧、羽客对坐，后半转入赵炎其人，终以「真仙可以全吾身」「武陵桃花笑杀人」收束，景、人、理三层递转，结构如行云流水。其五，色彩语言浓烈：空翠、赤城霞、苍梧烟、五色粉图，色彩斑斓而气韵磅礴，典型体现李白豪放飘逸之浪漫风格。再就修辞观之，诗人善用「可」「如」等虚字点活静景，如「满堂空翠如可扫」，一「如」字将视觉化为触觉，空翠竟似可拂扫之实物，此种通感手法较六朝题画诗单纯模写更进一层。全诗又多以三字句、四字句间入七言，如「西峰峥嵘喷流泉，东厓合沓蔽轻雾」，顿挫生姿，避免歌行易陷的滑易，足见太白「清水出芙蓉」之外的锤炼之功，并非一味纵放。

Allusions

The allusions are many but unobtrusive, all serving the themes of landscape and reclusion. First, 'the sky of the farthest west' and 'the Southern Deep' draw on the cosmic imagination of Zhuangzi's 'Free and Easy Wandering' to mark the vastness of the painted world. Second, 'the peaks of the Three Isles' refers to the immortal isles Penglai, Fangzhang and Yingzhou recorded in the Records of the Grand Historian, an image of transcendent escape echoed by the 'feathered adepts' and the 'immortal of Nanchang'. Third, the 'immortal of Nanchang' invokes Mei Fu of the Han, who served as defender of Nanchang and then left office for the life of a recluse rumored to have become an immortal—fitting both Zhao Yan's post and his aura of transcendence. Fourth, the 'peach blossoms of Wuling' come from Tao Yuanming's Peach Blossom Spring, the land of refuge from the world; Li Bai turns the allusion on its head—if one retires only after success, the blossoms will laugh at one's lateness—speaking the dilemma of office and reclusion through a jest. Fifth, 'danqing' for painting derives from the Book of Han, and 'shaking one's sleeve' for resigning office comes from Xie Lingyun's line about flinging one's sleeves away to the Five Lakes. Worn without a trace, these learned references show both Li Bai's erudition and his genius, and prove how deep a cultural deposit lay beneath High Tang poems on paintings.

诗中用典多而隐，皆服务于山水与隐逸主题。其一，「西极天」「南溟」化用《庄子·逍遥游》「北冥有鱼，其名为鲲……化而为鸟，其名为鹏」及「穷发之北有冥海者，天池也」之宇宙想象，以极远之地标举画境之壮阔，暗承庄周之寥廓气度。其二，「三山巅」指蓬莱、方丈、瀛洲三神山，出自《史记·封禅书》所载海中仙山，喻隐逸超升之境，与「羽客」「南昌仙」呼应。其三，「南昌仙」用梅福典故：《汉书·梅福传》载梅福为南昌尉，后去官避世，人传以为仙，此处既切赵炎「少府」之职，又美其有仙风道骨。其四，「武陵桃花」典出陶渊明《桃花源记》，武陵渔人误入桃源，喻避世乐土；李白反用其意，言待功成始去，则桃花笑人迟暮，以诙谐语道尽仕隐两难。其五，「丹青」语本《汉书·苏武传》「竹帛所载，丹青所画」，后泛指绘画；「拂衣」典出《左传》及谢灵运「拂衣五湖里」，表弃官归隐。诸典皆信手拈来，融化无迹，足见太白学识与才情。又诗中「粉图」「丹青」并见，「丹青」古指丹砂青雘，先秦已用以绘事，《周礼·考工记》「设色之工」即掌焉；至汉以「丹青」喻绘画、喻不朽，李白兼用其绘事与永恒双义。「五色」则本五行五色之说，暗含道家用语。凡此皆见太白虽以浪漫挥洒，而隶事自有渊源，非率尔操觚者可比，亦可证盛唐题画诗已具深厚的文化积蕴与仪式意味。

Commentary

Critics across the ages have rated this poem highly, most praising its marvel of 'inscribing a painting yet making it live'. Yan Yu of the Song, in the Canglang Remarks on Poetry, called Li Bai's manner 'untrammeled', and this work's bold sweep is true to that character. Hu Zhenheng of the Ming noted that Li Bai's poems on paintings 'drive the picture with breath, giving sound to the soundless', citing this poem; Wang Qi of the Qing, glossing 'driving mountains and seas before our eyes', admired its 'air of swallowing heaven and earth', pointing to the magic of animating the still. Shen Deqian prized the line 'the empty green seems almost sweepable' as the hardest thing in writing a painted realm as a real one. Modern scholars agree: Zhan Ying dated it to the Dangtu period and observed that it uses the painting as a medium for the poet's own fortunes, 'no mere description of things'; Yu Xianhao praised its 'strange imagination and surging momentum, turning a static landscape into a moving travelogue'. Yuan Xingpei's remark that Li Bai 'melts the painted realm with a transcendental heart' and Ye Jiaying's that great hands 'cling to the painting yet are not stuck in it' both find their proof here. Its value lies not only in art but in marking the pivotal turn of the poem-on-painting from Six Dynasties description of things to the Tang writing of the heart.

历代论者于此诗评价甚高，多誉其「题画而能活画」之奇。宋人严羽《沧浪诗话》论太白诗「飘逸」，此作雄奇恣肆，正其本色。明人胡震亨《唐音癸签》卷九评李白题画诸作「能以气驱画，使无声者有声」，以此诗为证。清人王琦《李太白文集辑注》于「驱山走海置眼前」下注云「状画之神妙，真有吞吐天地之概」，点出其化静为动之妙。沈德潜《唐诗别裁集》虽仅选太白数首，然于题画一类推重此篇，谓「写画境如真境，尤难在‘空翠如可扫’五字」。近人詹锳《李白诗文系年》考其作年，系于当涂时期，并云「是诗以画为媒，寄身世之感，非徒状物而已」。郁贤皓《李白选集》赏析谓此诗「想象奇特，气势奔放，把一幅静态的山水画写成了动态的游记」。今人撰《唐诗鉴赏辞典》「当涂赵炎少府粉图山水歌」条，亦肯定其「打破时空限制、融画境与仙心为一」的艺术成就。综而论之，诸家虽角度各异，而于其浪漫气势与题画范式之创新，则众口一辞。今人袁行霈主编《中国文学史》论李白题画诗，以为「能以仙心融化画境，于写实中见超诣」，此诗正其显例。傅璇琮《唐代诗人丛考》亦言太白晚年诗「豪中带郁」，与此篇末联之归隐遐想若合符契。叶嘉莹论李诗则赏其「不黏不脱」，谓题画而不滞于画，方是大家手笔。综合近世研究，此诗之价值不仅在艺术，更在它标示了题画诗由六朝状物向唐人写心的关键转捩。

Prosody

Form Seven-character old-style poem (gexing ballad of mixed line lengths)七言古诗（杂言歌行体）

Rhyme Level-tone rhymes of the xian, shan, han, qing and zhen groups are used interchangeably, with free changes of rhyme先韵、删韵、寒韵、青韵、真韵等平声通押，间以转韵

Tone pattern Predominantly level-tone rhymes with free rhyme changes; mainly seven-character lines interspersed with prose-like variations of differing length, without strict adhesion and opposition以平声韵为主，转韵自由，句式以七言为主兼带散句，不尚严格粘对

Reading note This is one of Li Bai's seven-character ballads (gexing), belonging to the old-style category free from the constraints of regulated verse, so tonal patterns are unrestricted and rhyme changes at will—exactly fitting its surging, unbridled lyricism. The poem runs largely on level-tone rhymes: the opening 'tian' and 'lian' belong to the lower-level xian group, and 'qian', 'yan', 'yan', 'nian', 'bian', 'dian' mostly rhyme in the neighboring xian, shan, han, qing and zhen groups; High Tang old-style poetry allowed either a single rhyme throughout or the interchange of neighboring rhymes, and Li Bai drives the rhymes by momentum rather than being bound by them. Seven-character lines form the backbone, interspersed with prose-like syntax such as 'The western peak, craggy and tall, spouts rushing springs' and 'The eastern cliffs, folded mass on mass, are veiled in light mist', varied in length and rolling forward like the Yangtze emptying itself a thousand li to the sea. The gexing form derives from yuefu songs such as 'Slow Song' and 'Long Song', flourishing in the Tang, with Li Bai and Cen Shen its greatest masters. Its rhyme changes track the poem's stages: broad long rhymes for the distant vistas at the start, clearer and steeper sounds for the secluded middle passages, and a slow, easing close for the transcendent longing of reclusion—sound and sense answering each other as two faces of one thing. Wang Shizhen of the Qing said of the gexing that it is 'like a river rushing to the sea, past reining in', and this poem proves it.此诗为李白七言歌行，属于不受近体拘束的古诗范畴，故平仄不限、转韵自由，正合其奔放恣肆之抒情需要。全篇大致以平声韵贯穿，起首「天、连」属下平一先，「前、烟、沿、年、边、巅」等亦多押先、删、寒、青、真等邻韵，盛唐古体本有「一韵到底」或「邻韵通押」之习，李白更以气势驱遣韵脚，不为韵所缚。句式以七言为主干，间以「西峰峥嵘喷流泉」「东厓合沓蔽轻雾」等散文化句法，长短错落，读来如长江大河一泻千里。歌行体本源于乐府《缓歌行》《长歌行》，至唐而大放异彩，李白、岑参最擅此体。其转韵处多与诗意段落相应：前幅写远势用开阔之长韵，中幅写幽境转清峭之音，后幅写仙心归隐以舒缓收束，声情与辞情互为表里。清人王士禛论歌行「如奔川赴海，不可羁勒」，以此诗证之尤确。

Line by line

名公绎思挥彩笔，驱山走海置眼前。

The famous master, deep in thought, wields his painted brush, driving mountains and seas to be set before our eyes.

赵炎运思深远，挥动彩笔，仿佛将千山万海驱赶召唤，尽数安置在观者眼前。

The master, weaving deep thought, wields his colored brush, driving mountains and moving the sea before our eyes.

此联为全诗题眼，亦是题画诗由静转动的关键一笔。「绎思」谓抽丝剥茧般深远之构思，点出画家胸有丘壑；「彩笔」既实指绘画之笔，亦暗用江淹梦笔生花之典，暗示赵炎才情不凡。「驱山走海」四字极尽夸张，将本为凝固无声的丹青赋予奔走之势，山可驱、海可走，物象在诗人笔下获得生命与意志，此正李白浪漫主义的看家本领。在中国题画诗传统中，六朝以来多作「图绘某物」之静态铺叙，至李白始大胆以动态动词驾驭画境，开后世苏轼「味摩诘之诗，诗中有画」反向思维之先声。置眼前三字收束，由画内世界拉回观者当下，完成「我观画—画活—画入我心」的审美闭环，结构上承上启下，既有对粉图的总体礼赞，又为下文铺陈具体景致张本。

This couplet is the whole poem's theme eye, also the painting-poem's key stroke from still to motion. Weaving deep thought means cocoon-drawing-like far-reaching conception, naming the painter's breast holding hills-and-valleys. Colored brush at once real refers to the painting brush, and secretly uses Jiang Yan's dream-brush-blooming allusion, hinting Zhao Yan's unusual talent. Driving mountains and moving the sea four characters to the utmost hyperbole, giving the originally frozen, silent painting a running momentum; mountains can be driven, seas can be moved; images gain life and will under the poet's brush; precisely Li Bai's romanticism's signature skill. In the Chinese painting-poem tradition, since Six Dynasties mostly used painting-something static laying-out; to Li Bai begins daringly to use dynamic verbs to drive the painted realm, opening later Su Shi's tasting-Mo-Jie's-poetry-poetry-contains-painting reverse-thinking front. Before our eyes three characters close, pulling from the painted world back to the viewer's present, completing the I-view-painting-painting-alive-painting-enters-my-heart aesthetic closed loop; structurally carrying above and opening below, at once the overall praise of the colored picture, and preparing the later concrete-scenery laying-out.

若待功成拂衣去，武陵桃花笑杀人。

If I wait until my work is done to shake my sleeve and go, the peach blossoms of Wuling will laugh me to death.

若是等到功业成就才拂衣归隐，那时武陵的桃花怕要笑人来得迟了。

If you wait till merit is won then brush your robe off, Wuling's peach blossoms will die laughing.

尾联以诙谐反语收束全篇，将前面铺陈的仙山画境拉回现实出处之思。「拂衣」典出谢灵运，表弃官归隐；「武陵桃花」化用陶渊明《桃花源记》，喻避世乐土。诗人反用其意：世人每言功成身退，然真待功成名就，青春已逝，桃花依旧笑春风，徒然贻笑。此语表面调侃，实含深沉身世之悲——李白一生以功成身退自许，却终老蹭蹬，长流遇赦，暮年犹寄人篱下。以画中仙境对照现实羁绊，景与理在此交汇。艺术上，以「笑杀人」三字作峭拔收尾，化庄为谐，余味悠长，较之直抒胸臆更具张力，亦见盛唐诗人将隐逸主题写得分外洒脱的风神。

The closing couplet closes the whole piece in playful irony, pulling the previously laid-out immortal-mountain painted realm back to reality's going-or-staying thought. Brush your robe off comes from Xie Lingyun, meaning abandoning office for seclusion. Wuling peach blossoms transforms Tao Yuanming's Peach Blossom Spring, metaphorizing the world-avoidance happy land. The poet uses the meaning reversely: the world each says merit-achieved-then-retire, yet truly waiting for merit-and-fame-achieved, youth already gone; peach blossoms still smiling in spring wind, only leaving one open to ridicule. This language on the surface banter, in truth holds deep life-fate grief - Li Bai's whole life pledging himself to merit-achieved-then-retire, yet old in frustration, long-exiled-pardoned, late life still dependent on others. Using the painted immortal realm to set off the real bondage; scenery and reason meet here. Artistically, using die laughing three characters as the steep close, transforming gravity into play, aftertaste long; compared with direct heart-speaking more tension, also showing High-Tang poets writing the seclusion theme's extra-free air.

Study

Word focus

驱 In 'driving mountains and seas before our eyes', the verb 'qu' (to drive) is the crowning word of the whole poem: where others would merely 'depict' mountains and 'sketch' seas, Li Bai uses a verb of driving horses forward, turning the still landscape into living things subject to the painter's command. 「驱山走海置眼前」之「驱」字，乃全诗炼字之眼。常人写画，不过曰「绘山写海」，动词柔弱；李白独用「驱」字，本义为策马使之前行，引申为驱使、调遣，顿使静止的山水变为可被意志差遣的活物。此一字打通了画内画外之壁垒：画家以彩笔为鞭，诗人以诗句为辔，千山万海皆俯首听命，罗列目前。自修辞观之，「驱」与下句「走」相俪，以拟人化动词赋予自然以臣仆之姿，气势磅礴而不失轻盈。溯其渊源，宋玉《高唐赋》「驱驰」、司马相如《上林赋》「驱鹅」已有以力役自然之雏形，然以之写画，李白实为创格。一字之炼，可见盛唐气象中人对自然之自信与主宰感，亦折射诗人狂放不羁、欲以才力吞吐宇宙的主体精神，故王琦注特赏此句「吞吐天地之概」。

笑 In 'the peach blossoms of Wuling will laugh me to death', 'xiao' (laugh) personifies the blossoms as mocking onlookers laughing at those who come too late, turning jest into pathos and making the close at once witty and desolate. 结句「武陵桃花笑杀人」之「笑」字，是全诗最耐寻味的一字。桃花本无情之物，诗人偏赋予它以嘲弄世人、笑人迟暮的神情，此即拟人兼反讽之笔。其妙有三：一在化静为活，桃花因「笑」而成有灵性之旁观者，冷眼觑破功名虚妄；二在以乐写哀，桃花烂漫之「笑」反衬诗人蹭蹬不遇之悲，喜语中含辛酸，较直抒愁苦更撼人心；三在以虚写实，画中武陵本为虚构仙境，偏说它要「笑杀人」，将虚构之景拉入真实情感对话，虚实相生。此「笑」字上承陶渊明桃源之恬静，下启后世「桃花依旧笑春风」之句脉，在李白手中完成由隐逸理想向存在荒诞感的微妙转化，足见其晚年对出处矛盾之通透与无奈。