徑回花果 Back to Flower-Fruit Mountain
你看他忍氣別了師父，縱觔斗雲，徑回花果山水簾洞去了。獨自個悽悽慘慘，忽聞得水聲聒耳。大聖在那半空裡看時，原來是東洋大海潮發的聲響。一見了，又想起唐僧，止不住腮邊淚墜，停雲住步，良久方去。你看他忍气别了师父，纵觔斗云，径回花果山水帘洞去了。独自个凄凄惨惨，忽闻得水声聒耳。大圣在那半空里看时，原来是东洋大海潮发的声响。一见了，又想起唐僧，止不住腮边泪坠，停云住步，良久方去。
逐句解 Line by line
Look at him: swallowing his anger, he took leave of the master, mounted his somersault cloud, and went straight back to the Water-Curtain Cave of the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit.
忍氣別了師父 (rěn qì bié le shī fu) "swallowing his anger, took leave of the master." 觔斗雲 (jīn dǒu yún) "somersault cloud," 斗 (dǒu). 花果山水簾洞 (Huā guǒ shān Shuǐ lián dòng) "the Water-Curtain Cave of the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit" — Wukong's old kingdom, the home he left to follow Tripitaka and now returns to in defeat.
Alone and forlorn, desolate with grief, he suddenly heard the sound of water assailing his ears.
獨自個悽悽慘慘 (dú zì ge qī qī cǎn cǎn) "all alone, wretched and desolate." 忽聞得水聲聒耳 (hū wén de shuǐ shēng guō ěr) "suddenly heard the sound of water din in his ears," 得 (de). The lonely, grief-stricken flight home is broken by a sound — the sea — that will, unexpectedly, undo him.
The Great Sage, looking down from the middle air, saw that it was the roar of the tide surging in the Great Eastern Ocean.
那半空 (nà bàn kōng) "the middle air," 那 (nà). 東洋大海潮發的聲響 (Dōng yáng dà hǎi cháo fā de shēng xiǎng) "the sound of the tide rising in the Great Eastern Ocean." The sea's roar is a small, ordinary thing — and it is enough to pierce the Great Sage's composure.
At the sight of it he thought again of the Tang Monk, and could not stop the tears from falling by his cheeks; he stayed his cloud and halted his steps, and only after a long while went on.
止不住腮邊淚墜 (zhǐ bú zhù sāi biān lèi zhuì) "could not stem the tears at his cheeks." 停雲住步 (tíng yún zhù bù) "stayed the cloud and halted." 良久方去 (liáng jiǔ fāng qù) "only after a long while went on." The chapter's last image of Wukong is of the Great Sage weeping — halted in mid-flight by the memory of the master who cast him out, unable to go on.
The chapter's final image of Wukong is not of power but of grief. Flying home alone, 獨自個悽悽慘慘, wretched and desolate, he is stopped by the roar of the Eastern Ocean's tide — and the sight of the sea recalls the master, and the tears fall. The Great Sage stays his cloud, halts, and can only go on 良久, after a long while. It is a portrait of loss stripped of all bravado.
The detail is psychologically exact. It is not the dismissal itself but a chance sight — the sea, glimpsed on the way home — that breaks Wukong's held-in composure, the way grief so often ambushes us not in the moment of loss but afterward, at some unrelated reminder. That the fearless Great Sage should be halted in the air by tears, unable to fly on, is the chapter's quiet insistence on the depth of the bond that has been severed.
The return to Flower-Fruit Mountain closes a circle. Wukong left his kingdom and his freedom to follow Tripitaka; he comes back to it now in defeat, weeping. But the reader knows — as the closing formula will hint — that this parting is not the end. The bond that grief here reveals is too strong to stay broken, and the master's need will soon call the disciple back.