Editor-in-chief testimonials
The theme of Li Nan's group of poems "A Man in the Mirror" can be analyzed and interpreted from two dimensions. The first is to reminisce about the past, thinking about the value of individual life in the grand historical process in the "past completion time", and the second is to ask questions about the present and explore the meaning of individual experience in trivial daily life in "the present tense". Her poems are designed to reveal, summarize, remind, and critique. With restrained emotion and timeless poetry, she shows the poet's sense of responsibility and the conscience of the intellectual. In her poetry, language is precise, direction is precise, thinking is precise, expression is exquisite. Behind the plain words is the thickness and depth of thought.
I really like her "Apartment for the Elderly in the Snow" and "A Man in the Mirror". "The Apartment for the Elderly in the Snow" is not so much a record of the visit as it is a prophecy for our tomorrow. In the poem, Li Nan shows us the old people, "every old man has an oral history / more real and more terrifying than in the textbook" - what kind of fate and encounter is that? And, she wrote sadly that "snowflakes no longer bring romance / Once tough, began to become cowardly / Now they quietly look at the sunset and sink / Memories, memories". These old people are our relatives, and even more so our tomorrow. In the poem "A Man in the Mirror", Li Nan throws us a set of paradoxes, which are the sparks of rational thinking and daily logic: "Don't think that literacy has culture / Don't underestimate the mission carried by ashes / / Illegal love is not blessed / Weeds can sometimes become rare medicinal herbs / / The sunset can also emit a strong light / The night will also breed lightning and give birth to thunder." Li Nan's poetry always brings us unexpected effects, as Dylan Thomas said in "On Poetry", "The magic of poetry is that it always gives people a sudden feeling."
Of course, I also appreciate poems such as "Jieshan Xing" and "Going to Xiyue and Jingcha Academy", which are written transparently, intellectually, and chewy. These qualities come from Li Nan's concept of "true poetry" writing, which she says is a prerequisite for poetry writing. "I can't imagine how a poet who is adulterated all over his body could write a good work that stirs people's hearts?" So, Li Nan is "trying to change writing with a mask on her face, or writing on a moral high ground," and she wants to "restore an everyday true self" — and apparently, she did. Poetry critic Li Li, commenting on her poem "The Call", pointed out that "the core of sincerity is true feelings and love." American poetess Audrey Lot once said in "Poetry is not a luxury" that poetry belongs to the body and the breath, but also to the soul and the city. Poetry is "the skeletal structure of my life" Let's read more of Li Nan's "true poems" and poems with souls.
—— Li Yun
Li Nan's poems
A Man in the Mirror (excerpts from the group poems)
Li Nan
Poetry teaching
From a drop of morning dew to the setting sun
Day after day.
From the dark pupils to the vicissitudes of the eyes
Years.
From lush to decaying, reborn in the midst of death
Endless.
In winter, there are warm suns comforting shivering streets
Occasional truth leaks in the annals of history
No one has the right to cancel the flight of the eagle...
All of this is my poetry.
Autumn alone on Fenglong Mountain
Autumn is sunny
The clouds are flying
Memories of ginkgo biloba leaves
It is still like this, falling unhurriedly.
The Poplar Brothers automatically stood in a row
Winter follows the berries.
Went to fenglong mountain in the suburbs
There was wind on the halfway slope, blowing through the purple-red stormtrooper suit.
It is rarely visited and the valley is silent
Only an occasional few birdsong pierced the air.
Tread on the dry grass and walk up a path
It's not straight, it's not wide either
This logo cannot be found on the map
He would not have found the Fenglong Academy hidden in the deep grass.
Wake up in the middle of the night
There is a promise
It has not been cashed in so far.
There is a person
I can't forget it.
There is a book
I never understood its true meaning.
There is a view
Entrenched at the end of the journey.
There is a stray dog
I couldn't take it home in the wind and rain
There is a thing in the past
Changed the course of this life.
When I woke up in the middle of the night, I saw the moonlight pouring in outside the window
Hold me tightly.
Snow to the elderly apartment
We can't underestimate the elderly
Sunbathing, picking up trash, bringing grandchildren
Tour buses get motion sickness
The bed was turned over by the nurse...
We can't get tired of those deep wrinkles
Think of them as old barks of vicissitudes
Because they all have a set in their hands
Deal with the secret weapon of life.
Let us not abandon saliva, pills and nagging
Take advantage of the heavy snow and go to the elderly apartment
Every old man has an oral history
More real and more terrifying than in the textbooks.
Snowflakes no longer bring romance
Those who were once strong, began to become cowardly
Now they watched quietly as the sun set
Memories, memories.
JieShan trip
Walk in the lush hills
The sky releases a clear blue
And how much history the white clouds have taken away.
A bend in a mountain path
Pine needles and cypress branches point out
- There's the meson push
A cave to hide.
During his lifetime, he cut off his shares and served the king
After death, it turned into a wisp of smoke.
Go to Xiyue and Jingcha Academy
At dusk, the sunset lingers in the western mountains
Mint and Celestial Chrysanthemum lined up at the gate to greet us
Friends have been gone for a long time – they have all come from afar
For the first time in this year of Gengzi.
Beer, peanuts, roast chicken, warm lamb kebabs
The hospitality of the host overflowed this long summer.
One speaks of bitter marriages
The other talked about the pandemic and meager pensions
But there are also unexpected laughter:
The little master used plasticine to make the first transaction in his life...
So we mixed the sad days with a little honey
Disappointed, but still with love.
The light attracts moths and leafhoppers
The moon emerges from the clouds and kindly prolongs the night
Friends talk about xingzheng, and only say it in the middle of the night
Hermann Hesse and his watercolor paintings.
A man in the mirror
A person in the mirror cannot see the sinful nature
Only the face of decaying can be seen.
A flock of sparrows is not because of the scarecrows in the field
And restrain your bad temper.
Don't think that literacy has culture
Don't underestimate the mission that ashes carry.
Step into the endless mountains and cross the vast desert
You will gradually let go of the knife and axe in your heart.
The marshmallows on the country road were dusty
It can still produce safflower and pink flowers.
Illegal love, not blessed
Weeds can sometimes become rare medicinal herbs.
There is a horror smell in death
No one will be obsessed for a long time.
In the tears of others, you do not feel pain
Only an escape exit can be found.
The sunset can also emit a strong light
The night also breeds lightning and thunder.
Life in the mountains
When birdsong
I read a poem
Under the tile house
Mallows contain dew
Raise your glass
The raindrops applauded on time
Walk down the hill
Breeze comes uninvited
Before dark
I thought of you again.
If I don't write it down
The flowers will turn into fruit
Disappeared its most beautiful predecessor
If I don't photograph the flowers.
Hide in a glacier on a snowy mountain
Transform into a river and rush towards the sea
If I don't draw the glacier.
Time eats up memories
The suffering of small people rises and falls in the whirlpool of history
If I don't write down the little people.
The black magpie flew away singing a song
Sometimes gloomy, sometimes happy
If I don't compose music.
And you, intruding into my dry heart
Did you bring roses, or tribulus?
If I don't ask in person.
essay
Poets are a scarce species
I'm probably a guy who doesn't like to hang out. Often, in life, I have no one to talk to, and loneliness and loneliness permeate every pore. Writing poetry is me and you, and him, and the other me talking to. I was careless, I couldn't do anything well, I often lost everything, and I always doubted that I didn't deserve to live a normal life.
Loneliness is the poet's only reliable friend, it has been cleaning up the poet's spiritual structure, removing those non-poetic fragments, the poet is accompanied by loneliness, loneliness makes the poet's heart clean, and it is also the best feedback to the poet.
When he was young, he once loved poetry avidly and regarded poetry as a spiritual religion. As the years passed, the love of poetry also shifted. In my opinion, there are many more important and valuable things in this world than writing poetry.
Poetry is not a white depiction and restoration of real life, let alone an elevation, but the highest fabrication intertwined between reality and imagination. "The linguistic success of poetry depends on the method of grouping words, and poetic expression must have a surprising effect," I said for the first time in 1990. Excellent poetry is expressed in a new, unfamiliar, uncertain element of language, but also in a kind of thinking that is "unexpected" and "reasonable". I tried to practice this through my own plain language.
I asked myself repeatedly, have I entered the interior of poetry? The answer is, I don't know. In writing poetry, I have many blind spots, and I dare not easily transgress them. Since entering the new century, my poetic style has changed a lot. The original pursuit of the absolute purity of poetic language has now gradually disappeared, mixed with many seemingly cloudy verses; and from the poetic capture, it is also constantly broadening the boundaries of expression; the original form of a single and whole chant has now become contradictory and polyphonic. The more I wrote, the more I found that there were too many elements that I didn't understand, from the challenge of poetic skills to the screening of the object of expression.
My poet friends around me talk about the master with a look of envy, and I am often confused about this question. I often wonder if our current writing is worthy of this era of upheaval and in an age of spiritual deprivation. I think of poets of the past, how did they face their times and use poetry to express what they experienced? Whenever I think of this, I feel that the road as a poet is long, and our distance from the master is almost desperate. But it doesn't matter, for me, writing poetry is just a process of completing myself.
Since the writing of vernacular poetry, the progress of poetry has been accompanied by spiritual liberation, language innovation, and creativity. In today's world, fast-paced life, the consumption of fast-food culture, and the intervention of the Internet are undoubtedly eroding the lyrical nature of poetry bit by bit. Deconstruction is certainly a contribution to poetry, and I have more respect for those poets who have contributed to the construction of poetry.
Being able to become a good poet is also the unremitting pursuit of many poets. I think a good poet is the norm: classic writing, cross-genre mastery, and sustainable creativity.
For a while, I had doubts about poetry. Since it cannot change the poet's three views and cannot bring a rich material life to the poet, why are there always poets who come and go and continue to join the ranks of poets? I wrote in a poem: The poet is a species/endangered. But I am pleased to see wave after wave of young poets who are better educated, more knowledgeable, and more creative than ours, who have been justifying the existence of poetry. Because at present, this problem is questioned by many people, the niche existence of poetry is an indisputable fact, which is also a test of a poet in the true sense, his concentration, his obsession, his unconditional love for words, he resolutely and without hesitation to assume this responsibility, they are the scarce species of this era.
For the past two years, I have been learning how to release myself in poetry. I'm trying to change writing with a mask, or writing from a moral high ground, restoring an everyday true self. It so happens that I read Milosz's Urrodi, and in the first chapter he writes about this question, saying that "to release oneself means to talk to the reader, while expecting their understanding and trusting eyes", but how to release oneself? He didn't talk about it.
In my shallow understanding, to release oneself is to dig out from personal memories, to find from personal experience, to feel from daily life, to temper from repeated word practice, but as a person who is shy at heart, can you open your heart to the reader? This is not only a matter of linguistic expression, but also of poetic ethics.
The American poet Frost said a passage that I remember deeply: "If the author writes without tears, the reader will not read with tears." Since the person who writes has no surprises, the person who reads it will never find it interesting. ”
This is talking about the poet's "truth", and "truth" is the prerequisite for the poet's poetry writing. I can't imagine how a poet who is adulterated all over his body could write a good work that excites people's hearts. Of course, it is not as long as there is "truth", you can definitely write good poetry, poetry is an art in the end, the way of art has its own characteristics, and the language of poetry is a lifelong lesson for a poet. Sincerely facing the reader, truly writing the heart, truly caring for the world, the truth of the heart and the illusion of art have a wonderful balance, and it is possible to write excellent poetry. I strive to avoid air-to-air lyricism myself. A pile of gorgeous words and phrases, in the poem can not see the face of the poet, can not feel the poet's heartbeat, even if not a little, such a poem is undoubtedly a pseudo-poem.
How to identify a good poem? When you first learn to write poetry, you can't judge, often people are in the clouds, where a poem is good, where the magic is, you have not yet been able to pinpoint it. It doesn't matter, we are all through a long poetry practice period, a lot of reading, going to the heart, or talking to the poet's friends, you will have new growths, distinguish the good or bad of a poem, this problem will be solved.
In the past two years, the global epidemic has changed the world, and it can be said that everyone has an opportunity for deep reflection, about living and dying, the subtleties of human nature... All this is our reality. I have been silent for a long time, unable to describe it in poetic terms.
I'm still writing. I often look up at the high pyramid tip of poetry, which is bitter and bitter, and the heart knows itself.
——Excerpted from poetry monthly magazine 2022 No. 3 solo show
(Image from the Internet)
【Personal Profile】:
Li Nan, originally from Wugong County, Shaanxi Province, was born in Qinghai in 1964 and now lives in Shijiazhuang City, Hebei Province. In 1983, he began to write poetry, and his works have been included in various anthologies at home and abroad, and he has won the Changyao Poetry Award, the Xu Zhimo Poetry Award, the October Annual Poetry Award, and the Caotang Annual Poetry Award. Published poetry collections "Time Let Go of Hand" and "Song of Compromise".
