What is the stem of the self-hanging southeast branch?

Self-hanging from the southeast branch means hanging oneself.

"Hanging oneself on a branch in the southeast" is a line from the Han Dynasty Yuefu poem "The Peacock Flying Southeast" during the Han Dynasty in my country. The original meaning is "hanging oneself on a branch in the southeast direction." However, the original meaning of ? later changed to "hang yourself in the worst case" and became an Internet buzzword.

It originated from a song of the same name, "Self-Hanging Southeast Branch". Later, it was widely joked in the B station animation "One Hundred Thousand Cold Jokes", so it became popular.

The content of the sentence in "The Peacock Flies Southeast"

This sentence: "When the officials heard about this, they knew they would be separated for a long time. They wandered under the tree in the courtyard and hung themselves on the southeast branch. The two families asked for help. They were buried together near Huashan. Pines and cypresses were planted on the east and west, and sycamores were planted on the left and right. There were two flying birds in the middle, which called themselves mandarin ducks. I am so hesitant. Thank you to future generations, please be careful not to forget!”

Translation: When Jiao Zhongqing heard about Liu Lanzhi’s suicide, he knew in his heart that he would never be separated from Liu Lanzhi in the courtyard. After wandering under the tree for a while, he hung himself on a branch facing the southeast. The Jiao and Liu families requested to be buried together, so they were buried together next to Huashan Mountain. Pine and cypress trees were planted on the east and west sides of the tomb, and plane trees were planted on the left and right sides of the tomb.

The branches (of these trees) cover each other, and the leaves are connected to each other. There is a pair of flying birds in the tree. Their names are mandarin ducks. They raise their heads and scream at each other. They scream every day and night until the fifth watch. The walkers stopped to listen, and the widow heard it and got up from her bed, feeling very uneasy. I would like to advise future generations to take this incident as a lesson and never forget it!