Du Fu was one of the greatest realist poets of the Tang Dynasty.
The Tang Dynasty poet Du Fu had a friend named Wang Jiyou, also a poet, who loved reading but lacked skill in currying favor, leaving his household in constant poverty.
Wang Jiyou's wife was a vain person. Seeing her husband as a bookworm, she often complained he was useless—unable to become an official or earn money. Wang Jiyou, unfairly scolded, naturally refused to accept this:
"What's wrong with me? I may not have money, but I'm poor in wealth, not in spirit—I won't grovel before the powerful." "You can endure poverty, but I can't!" his wife fumed. Wang Jiyou, unable to bear her endless reproaches, finally divorced her.
When some heard the news, instead of sympathizing with Wang Jiyou, they actually spoke ill of him, accusing him of abandoning his wife.
Du Fu also heard these slanderous rumors about Wang Jiyou and felt deeply unjust for his old friend. So he wrote a poem titled "Lamentable," a seven-character ancient verse. In the opening two lines, Du Fu sighed with emotion:
The drifting clouds in the sky resemble a white robe, yet in an instant they transform into a gray dog—a reminder that worldly affairs are ever-changing and unpredictable. This line from Du Fu's poem captures the essence of life's impermanence, urging us to embrace change with wisdom and grace.
In an instant, the white clouds transformed into gray hounds.
Throughout the ages, all times are the same.
In life, there is nothing that cannot happen!
The poem's meaning is: the drifting clouds in the sky clearly resemble white clothes, yet in a moment they turn into the shape of a gray-haired dog; from ancient times to the present, how many things in the human world are not also like this? He let out a deep sigh over how a person of upright conduct like Wang Jiyou could suddenly be described as someone of low character.
"White clouds turn into gray dogs," also written as "white robes turn into gray dogs," is used to describe the fickleness of worldly affairs.
Source: Du Fu (Tang Dynasty), *Ke Tan*
Meaning of the Idiom: Later, the Chinese idiom "白云苍狗" came to describe how the fickleness of worldly affairs.