Ai Qing's Fish Fossil is also a philosophical poem. However, unlike Bian's poems of the same name, which are obscure in history and semantic expression, Ai Qing has learned a painful life lesson from fish fossils, which has strong practical significance, and tells the most common and basic philosophy of life with vivid images and simple and ordinary language through symbolic techniques.
The whole poem consists of seven sections, which can be divided into four layers poetically. The first section (section 1) describes the dance of fish's life, the second section (section 2) describes the tragedy of fish's life destruction, the third section (sections 3, 4 and 5) describes the morphology of fish fossils, and the fourth section (sections 6 and 7) describes the poet's understanding and suggestion of fish fossils.
A remarkable feature of Ai Qing's poems in art is that he is good at combining symbolic lyricism with philosophical thinking to express his feelings about life, life and life. Specifically, this poem is mainly philosophical, which makes the symbolic meaning more clear. At the same time, with vivid images, vivid images full of enlightenment and suggestion, readers' thinking space is expanded and people are guided to explore the meaning and true meaning of life. This not only avoids the obscurity of symbols and hints, but also avoids the boredom of reasoning, thus achieving the organic integration of simplicity and profundity, symbols and philosophy. First of all, this poem depicts a vivid image symbolizing fish fossils. It used to be a lively and energetic life, jumping and floating freely in the sea. But a sudden catastrophe-volcanic eruption or earthquake-buried it in the dust and turned it into a biological fossil. Many years later, it was discovered again At this time, although it is a complete physical creature, it is "lifelike", "scales and fins are complete" and "motionless", and there is not even a sigh, only silence, and its life has come to an end. However, the poet did not stop at the bitter chewing on history, but revealed the objective truth that enlightens reality and shows the future in the lessons of history-"Without exercise, there is no life" and expressed the mind that "to live is to struggle,/to advance in the struggle,/to play clean even if you die".