Original poem:
It's been a long time, and it hasn't changed for thousands of years. The so-called Iraqis are in the water. Tracing back and forth from it, the road is blocked and broken. Swim back from the inside and swim in the water.
Translation:
The reeds by the river are dense, and the morning dew is not dry. Where is the right person? Just beyond the river bank. Sail against the current, it is hard to go climbs. Follow the running water to find her, as if on a beach.
Source: Jia Xu, an anonymous novel in the pre-Qin period.
Poetry appreciation
The most valuable thing in this poem is not the pursuit and loss of the lyric hero, but the artistic conception of "being on the water side" created by him, which has universal significance. Good poetry can create artistic conception. Artistic conception is a pattern and a structure, which has the performance of containing all heterogeneous things with similar patterns and structures.
The structure of On the Water is: chasing troops-rivers-Iraqis. Because the "Iraqi people" in the poem has no specific reference, and the meaning of the river lies in the barrier, all the pursuits that are difficult to achieve because of being blocked in the world can be isomorphic and resonate here.