He won and so bounded up the career ladder. The incident is referred to in another poem by Wen Tingyun, and must have been regarded with at least a tinge of envy. The Golden Horse Gate itself refers to the Palace. The other place referred to is Jiangdong, an old alternative name for Xuancheng, an area around the southern bank of the Yangzi, below Wuhu, near Nanjing. It was this city that Yang won.
Farewells are a very common theme of Oriental poems.