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movement eastward that was noted by the poet-narrator (as no such movement exists in the poem) but a
hope that the bird could speak on the poet-narrator's behalf to those at home writing letters, and in
effect traverse the gap between himself and home. How the parrot might deliver such a message is not
stated, though one might surmise, if one were so inclined, that after flying east or perhaps being
captured and brought to the capital, as was the fate of Mi Heng's parrot, 69 it might finally be able to
deliver the poet-narrator's message.
Conclusion
This chapter has endeavoured to show how the manner of perception itself was capable of
expressing the omnipresent emotion of homesickness on the distant frontier setting. In doing so, the
spatial coordinates of the poet-narrator's perceptual facet in several poems were read as suggestive of a
heart burdened by thoughts of home and feelings of separation. In another group of poems, the way the
poet-narrator focalized specific mobile and linguistic features of three frontier setting existents was also
discussed as being indicative of how acts of perception can be guided by and expressive of the poetnarrator's
emotional state. Of course, the way a poet-narrator perceives the frontier landscape of vast
distances is not the only avenue open to expressing homesickness. Aside from the earlier examples
provided at the beginning of this chapter, rhetorical questions, too, made by the poet-narrator referring
to a time of return and the location of the capital can also convey a state of homesickness:
西 行 殊 未 已
东 望 何 时 还
终 日 风 与 雪
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连 天 沙 复 山
This westward travelling has yet to cease;
Gazing east – when will I return?
All day just wind and snow,
Sands and mountains stretch into the sky.
(“Sent to Administrative Assistant Yuwen”, lines 1-4)
长 安 何 处 在
Where is Chang'an located?
69
See earlier footnote to “When Heading to Beiting and Passing Long Mountain I Think of Home”.
70
CSJJZ, p. 86.