Sympathy for farmers (I)
[Tang] Li Shen
Plant a millet in spring,
Ten thousand seeds were harvested in autumn.
There are no idle fields in the four seas,
Farmers still starve to death.
This poem is the second poem in Shen Li's poems that sympathizes with farmers. It describes that farmers work hard all the year round, but in the end they can't get rid of the fate of starvation, and criticizes and satirizes the phenomenon that exploiters brutally oppress working people. The first two sentences of the poem first say "spring planting" and "autumn harvest", which vividly shows the scene of farmers' bumper harvest and has a feeling of jubilation. However, the last two sentences of the poem turn to describe the reality and expound the argument that even if the country has no idle land, farmers can't get rid of the fate of starvation. This can't help but make people think, what is the reason for this phenomenon? In this way, the exploiters hidden behind the poems appeared, all of which were caused by them. This poem is rich in ideological content and has strong social significance. This is a famous poem.