Wang Anshi's poem on New Year's Day is:
The year is gone with the sound of firecrackers, and the spring breeze brings warmth to Tusu.
Thousands of households always exchange old talismans for new peaches.
The writing background of the poem:
Yuan Day is the first day of the first lunar month, which is the Spring Festival. When this poem was written, Wang Anshi had just begun to implement the New Deal after becoming Prime Minister. In order to get rid of the political and economic crises faced by the Northern Song Dynasty and the constant intrusion from Liao and Xixia, in the first year of Xining in the Northern Song Dynasty (AD 1068), Song Shenzong summoned Wang Anshi to "come to the right more and more times", and Wang Anshi wrote a letter advocating reform. The following year, he was appointed as the political advisor and presided over the reform. On the New Year's Day of the same year, Wang Anshi thought of the new atmosphere at the beginning of the reform and wrote this poem.
This is a poem about welcoming the New Year in ancient times. It is based on folk customs. It sensitively captures the typical materials of ordinary people celebrating the Spring Festival and captures the representative details of life: lighting firecrackers, drinking. Tusu wine and new peach charms fully express the joyful atmosphere of the New Year and are full of strong flavor of life. And these portrayals of ancient Spring Festival customs are not what today’s Spring Festival should look like.