Couplet in Semicursive Script (Xingshu)

For this couplet dedicated to a friend, the Qing dynasty loyalist and official Shen Cengzhi modified a work by the Tang dynasty poet Du Fu (712–770). Shen's version reads:
Painted vessels are hung upside down from parrots' beaks.
Old branches of green parasol trees serve as perches for phoenixes.

The inspiration for Shen's two lines was the poem "Autumn Impromptu" (Qiuxing), which Du Fu wrote in 766 while taking refuge in Kuizhou, (in what is now Sichuan province) during an extended period of warfare. Du's poem describes the glory days of the Han imperial hunting ground. Located southeast of the capital, it was filled with exotic plants, animals, and birds from all over of the country, and specimens presented as tribute from foreign kingdoms. The two lines from Du Fu's original poem read:
Grains from the fragrant fields are pecked and dropped by parrots.
Old branches of green parasol trees serve as perches for by phoenixes