In the eighth month, the hall is empty
Facing a wild, cracked wasteland ahead
Unbolting gates, spreading doors
The morning crow not yet lit by light
All things to left and right
Sparse, wild, and overbearing
Master Tiansui, startled and trembling
Feels as if a common army's duty falls on him
What was a moat becomes a ditch
What was a rampart becomes a wall
What was a commander's banner becomes a cassia tree
What was a troop becomes a bamboo grove
The jagged fir trees cluster like spears
Plantain leaves stand like banners
Dry mugwort bundled like arrows
Twisting vines drawn like bowstrings
Frogs join in aiding the horns
Birds part to begin the march
As if leather advances but metal halts
Surely turning from Yin to embrace Yang
Not long after
Clouds act as commander
Wind issues orders as chief
Vast, bleak, and desolate
Destroying, perilous, shattering, cutting
Smoke shrouds and burns above
Rain arrays prick below
Like moats: they pour out
Like ramparts: they break open
Like banners: they are suppressed
Like troops: they scatter
Like spears: they snap
Like banners: they split
Like arrows: they fall prostrate
Like bowstrings: they are torn apart
Like horn-blowers: they are struck dumb
Like marchers: they are terrified
Stones that had hair are all bound
Trees that had ears are all beheaded
Cloud, wind, rain, smoke
Proud in their victorious momentum
Fir, bamboo, plantain, vine
Shattered in their defeated spirit
Master Tiansui says: Alas! If autumn has no deity, so be it
But if it does have one
I am ashamed for you
In the capital regions north and south
Banditry has risen for five cycles
In provinces and great cities
Tiger tallies and dragon flags
Crumbled like tiles, shattered like ice
Divided like melons, scattered like beans
Axes strike the aged
Spears pierce nursing infants
Yesterday's houses today are ashes
Morning people are evening corpses
Ten thousand calves devoured in one bite
A thousand granaries consumed in one cooking
Harassing and trampling the northern borders
Exterminating and wounding the Dan tribes
Taking hostages from defending generals
Breaching and plundering cities and walls
Bow-arms not worn down
Armor lacing not coming loose
The vicious leaders sing and laugh
Carving up the land without doubt
Heaven has four seasons
Autumn is in charge of punishment
Shaohao, with his back to the screen
Personally receives all spirits at court
Rushou is his minister
Venus is his general star
It can bring haze or lightning
It can bring wind or thunder
It can bring trenches, drowning, collapse, pitfalls
It can bring untimely death and bewildering darkness
Yet you forgot fierce battle and slaughter
Thinking yourself clear and peaceful
If you blame the wax-offering rites
Who will bear the brunt of Heaven's wrath?
Why then bully the desolate courtyard
Trample the broken steps
Uproot the lofty angelica
Break the aged orchids
Tear off thatched roofs to show strength
Snatch reed ropes to make a show
Merely oppressing the weak and drooping
Maiming, crippling, destroying, replacing
This can be called abandoning the root for the branch
Forsaking the great for the trivial
His words not yet finished
His expression one of shame
Then, those fallen stop
Those prostrate rise