A thousand sails crowded the river, masts standing like a forest.
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樯 is a literary word for a ship's mast, by extension the whole sailing vessel. The famous line 樯倾楫摧 ('masts toppled, oars smashed') is from 范仲淹's 《岳阳楼记》 (Record of Yueyang Tower).
The wood radical on the left. A mast is a long wooden pole, so 木 gives the meaning category — it groups 樯 with timber and pole words like 桅 (mast) and 杆 (pole).
Supplies the sound. Standalone 啬 means stingy, but here it contributes only pronunciation, with the initial drifting to give qiáng. The same phonetic appears in 墙 (wall).
