浮想联翩

fú xiǎng lián piān

a stream of thoughts and images comes to mind

Character by character

浮fú
floating

想xiǎng
thoughts

联lián
linked

翩piān
fluttering

站在长城上，他浮想联翩，仿佛回到了两千年前。

Standing on the Great Wall, he let his imagination run free, as if he had gone back two thousand years.

Tone: positive (praise).

Usually set off by a scene, a photo, music or a poem. 翩 is piān, not biǎn. A favourite of school essays: 让人浮想联翩.

Learn this in Lesson 225 · HSK 9+: 新诗一百年 (A century of modern poetry)

A dialogue, a reading, word cards with audio and a drill that uses it, in Learn Chinese with Bao. The first lessons of every level are free.