Dunhuang
Dunhuang Grottoes are like horses' bellies/the sound of wooden barrels/milk dripping through their ears-/like flowers hanging from torn ears on the grassland in the distance.
Dunhuang is a forest where a fire broke out thousands of years ago/in a strange valley/the last mulberry forest-where I exchanged salt and food/I built a cave. Before I died, I drew the image of you/the last handsome man/for a female squirrel/for a female bee/for them to get pregnant again in spring.
1986
In fact, Dunhuang here symbolizes the ancient civilization and culture of China reflected in the murals of Dunhuang Grottoes, and the whole poem is a praise for this civilization and culture, as well as for the builders who built Dunhuang Grottoes with their lives.
"Dunhuang Grottoes are like the sound of wooden barrels/milk dripping under a horse's stomach". The poet imagines Dunhuang Grottoes as a picture of milking a horse and the horse's milk dripping into a wooden barrel. The ancient civilization displayed in Dunhuang Grottoes infected the poet. The poet feels that the civilization mapped by the grotto murals flows into the poet's spiritual world like dripping horse milk. The poet felt that this civilization lasted for a long time and nurtured the local people. The poet thinks that this kind of "drip" and "milk" is like a flower in full bloom, hanging in his ear. In fact, it is a compliment to the ancient civilization of China symbolized by Dunhuang Grottoes.
"Dunhuang was a forest with fire thousands of years ago", and the poet compared Dunhuang to "a forest with fire", symbolizing the glorious past and subsequent decline of Dunhuang and the decline and decline of this ancient civilization in the historical process. "In a strange valley/the last mulberry forest-where I exchanged salt and food/I built a cave. Before I died, I drew the image of you/the last handsome man/for a female squirrel/for a female bee/for them to get pregnant again in spring." It depicts that in the process of the decline of ancient civilization, the creators of Dunhuang Grottoes carved ancient civilization on the stone wall with their lives, precisely because of their creation.
The first part of the poem is to praise the ancient civilization and culture of China symbolized by Dunhuang, and the second part is to praise the builders of Dunhuang Grottoes.