Abroad, a foreign friend once asked me: "There are many interesting places in China, can you tell me the most worthwhile place to go?" One, please just say one. ”
I have encountered such a question many times, and the answer that I often spit out is: "Three Gorges!"
Down the Yangtze River, the starting point of the Three Gorges is the White Emperor City. This head is so beautifully opened.
For Chinese with a little culture, most of them know that the Three Gorges also begin with the White Emperor City. Li Bai's famous poem can be read in primary school textbooks.
I was less than 10 years old reading this poem, and the first sentence I came up with was misunderstood. "The White Emperor was in the clouds", "The White Emperor" was of course a person, and Li Bai bid him farewell early in the morning. Dressed in a white silver robe, the emperor stood high above the rocks. Since he was dressed in white, he would not be very old, tall, thin, melancholy and serene, the cold wind dance in the early morning played with his fluttering clothes, and the brilliant morning glow burned the sky, and his silver robe reflected each other, making people's eyes full of light and color. He had no retinue or bodyguard, and he got up early in the morning alone, and the poet's long-distance boat was about to untie the cable, and he was still holding his hand and whispering. His voice was also like pure silver, echoing among the silent mountains and rivers. But his words were hard to hear clearly, as if they were from another world. He lived in a small town at the top of the mountain, and ruled over the Cong Shan and Bijiang River here.
Many years later, I already knew how ridiculous the misunderstandings of my childhood were, but when I actually took a boat through the White Emperor City, I still looked up reverently, looking for the silver robe and the color of the rainbow. The ship's announcer was reciting the poem, introducing a few words in an excited tone, and releasing the music of "White Tito Lonely". Suddenly, landscapes, history, childhood fantasies, and the potential of life all poured into a ball, shocking people silly.
"White Emperor Tuo Lonely" is a Peking opera, which tells that the defeated Liu Bei retreated to the White Emperor City and died of depression, entrusting his son and political affairs to Zhuge Liang. The melodious sound cavity floated on the swirling river, crashing into the wet rocks, sad and desolate. The sound of pure silver could not be found, and for a moment he forgot Li Bai's lightness and dashingness.
I think that the White Emperor City originally cast two voices and two gods: Li Bai and Liu Bei, poetry and war, heroism and depression, pilgrimage to natural beauty and competition for the domination of mountains and rivers. It stands high above the mountains, and at its feet is a mighty river that argues day and night for these two themes.
The huaxia rivers and mountains can be a battlefield full of corpses, or a paradise where cars and boats come and go; It is possible for a feudal power to light and extinguish the fire of life, or to bless the poets with the great power of life. Poor White Emperor City was so tired, in the early morning, he had just sent away Li Bai's light boat, and at night, he had to meet Liu Bei's horseshoe. However, with the passage of time, the protection of this mountain and river for the poets is weakening day by day, their boats are stranded from time to time, their belts are often scorched, and they go from high to bitter, from bitter to silent. China, how many poets are left?
Fortunately, some verses and some memories have been preserved. Fortunately, there are so many Chinese remember that one morning, there was such a poet who quietly boarded the boat under the White Emperor City. I can't tell how big the reason is, and there has been no farewell ceremony, but it has finally been remembered for a thousand years, and it will be written down until the earth is barren. Here is revealed the hunger and thirst of a people: they should have had more such calm mornings.
In Li Bai's time, the Chinese nation was not too dull, and such poets came and went in this land, and it was not as strange as it is today. They do not have government affairs and business sentiments on their bodies, but only carry a pair of sharp eyes and a poetic feeling, circling between mountains and rivers and marrying the earth. It is enough to write rows of worthless verses and chant among friends. They regard this kind of behavior as a serious thing, and they are not afraid of the wind, food, and sleep, and travel long distances. As a result, standing at the center of the Tang Dynasty were not emperors, not noble concubines, not generals, but these poets. Yu Guangzhong's "Looking for Li Bai" poem Yun:
The wine entered the intestines, and seven minutes became the moonlight
The remaining three points roared into sword qi
As soon as the embroidery mouth spits out, it is half a shengtang
These few sentences, I have always regarded as a rare song in the contemporary Chinese poetry world.
The poets of Li Bai's era were both in love with The terroir and cultural relics of Sichuan and yearned for the open civilization of the Lower River, and the Yangtze River thus became the way of their lives, and they did not have to make too much determination to untie the cable. Where the feet are, the hometown is where it is, where the water is, the road is where it is. They know that the most dangerous place on the Yangtze River is undoubtedly the Three Gorges, but they know even more that it is the riverbed of the most turbulent poems. Their ship was too small to rest from time to time, and as soon as they arrived at the White Emperor City, they were refreshed and prepared for a powerful collision of life against nature. I can only ask those who scratch their heads and groan among the yellow curly green lamps not to write poems, which do not belong to poets. The poet was on a small wooden boat in the Three Gorges, and had just bid farewell to the White Emperor City.
Bidding farewell to the White Emperor City, we entered the Three Gorges, which is about 200 kilometers long. On waterways, 200 km is not a short distance. But you will never feel that the Creator is writing too lengthy articles. The strength and beauty gathered here will not be boring if it is spread out for 2,000 kilometers.
Zhai Tang Gorge, Wu Gorge, Xiling Gorge, each canyon is condensed into dense layers, and no matter how slow the speed of travel, they cannot be dissolved. Even the sun and moon, which are shining thousands of miles, cannot be squeezed here. In this regard, Li Daoyuan, 1500 years ago, said it best:
The two sides of the river are connected by mountains, and there is no gap.
Heavy rocks stacked on top of each other, hidden in the sky, from the non-pavilion midnight, not seeing the moon.
(Notes on the Water Classics)
He also used the most frugal words to carve through the Spring and Winter of the Three Gorges, "Qing Rong Junmao", and the "Lin Han Jian Su" of the Qing Chu Feng Dan, making it difficult for posterity to mobilize the words described.
Crossing the Three Gorges was originally looking for words that could not be used. You can only be honest, let the whizzing wind blow, let the gushing river splash, let the confused eyes stay, and let the voice that has repeatedly screamed be dumb. Think of nothing, let alone say anything, let life be frightened again and again. Don't wake up from the fright, sober people can't stand these Three Gorges.
Suddenly there was some "Yi Oh" sound around the stiff side, that is, the goddess peak of Wushan Mountain arrived. The goddess stood on her side between the peaks, bringing a little relief to the frightened human beings. It seems that the heavens suddenly thought of making up a representative when laying out this ceremony, so that the small creatures that squirmed between the mountains and rivers occupied a corner of the ceremony. Of course, the chosen ones are women, and at the right age and graceful style, the real masterpiece of humanity can only be them.
People poured the most magnificent legends into her, as if determined to let her absorb the beauty of the world, so as to compete with the natural elves. She said that she helped Dayu cure the water, that she had a secret meeting with the King of Chuxiang at night, that she had a ringing sound when she walked, and that she was full of strange fragrance when she returned from the clouds and rain. However, the legend belongs to the legend, after all, she is only a pillar of boulders, a dangerous peak, just a humorous comfort of natural forces to human beings.
When Li Bai had already descended the river, the people who remained could only entrust her withered lives. The word "goddess" has finally moved from magnificent to adulterous, and either one is far away from the sound individual life. The warm body, the uninhibited laughter, and the fragrance of love are all sculpted into an ancient shape, which remains between the mountains. A people of hundreds of millions of people has long enjoyed several broken myths.
Again, the poet is the first to see through. A few years ago, among the countless passengers on the river boat looking up at the Goddess Peak, a woman suddenly shed tears. She was sad because she had inadvertently become a descendant of Li Bai. She finally walked to the cabin and wrote these lines of poetry:
In the colorful flower pads waving at you
Whose hand was suddenly withdrawn
Cover your eyes tightly
When people scattered, who was still standing at the stern
The dress flew like a cloud that kept pouring in
Jiang Tao
Shout high
A low voice
Beautiful dreams leave beautiful sorrows
Heaven on earth, passed down from generation to generation
But, heart
Can it really turn into stone?
Along the riverbank
A torrent of golden light chrysanthemums and privets
New betrayals are being instigated
Instead of exhibiting millennia on a cliff
It is better to cry on the shoulder of a lover for one night
(Shu Ting: "Goddess Peak")
Finally, people got tired of watching and went back to the cabin to rest.
Inside the cabin was a group of prescient men who had never been out of the hatch from the beginning, sitting quietly, self-sufficient and serene. Let the mountains and rivers dance their teeth and claws outside, there are four walls, there are cabin roofs, there are beds. It is said that the Three Gorges should build a reservoir, and it is best to save it from being noisy. Turn off the radio, and don't let Li Bai bother again.
History ends here, mountains retreat here, poets wither here. Soon, only some foreign tourists were left on the side of the ship, still screaming.
Outside the ship, Wang Zhaojun's hometown passed. Perhaps it was the torrent here that washed this woman's heart away, Gu Panshengfeng, the world's gorgeous, but let the palace girl not do it, willing to marry the grassland Xiongnu, and finally died in another country. Her astonishing actions have made Chinese history dredge up a steep passage like the Three Gorges. Outside the ship, Qu Yuan's hometown passed. Perhaps it was qifeng here who gave him a proud bone, this crazy poet who was older than Li Bai was too restless, with a long sword and a waist, full of fantasies, traversing the Central Plains, asking the heavens and the earth, and finally throwing himself into the Miluo River, for a while, the river water there also stirred up the waves of the Three Gorges.
It seems that people who set out from the Three Gorges, whether male or female, are weird. It will roll up a little vortex and launch some collisions. They were all a bit rebellious, and they were all magnificent and amazingly rebellious. None of them ended in their hometown, just like the water of the Three Gorges flowing in all directions.
The Three Gorges is destined to be a restless abyss. With its strength, who knows what the land that carries it will look like?
The foreign tourists who scream on the side of the ship, and the foreign friends who ask me about China's first scenic spot, you will not really understand the Three Gorges after all.
Do we know? Our ship was moving in peace and quiet, and the cabin was full of laughter and smoke.
Tomorrow morning, it will arrive at a pier and then set sail slowly. No goodbye, no excitement, no chanting.
Leaving a tranquility for the Three Gorges, Li Bai went far away.
Fortunately, there was also a female poet who left a promise from Jin Guangju and a female virgin, so that you could quietly dream on a moonless night, eagerly looking forward to it.