1. Appreciation of the original "Old Horse": The whole poem consists of two sections and eight lines, which constitute two loaded pictures, like close-ups in movies, depicting a sad picture of an old horse-drawn cart. There is no tyrannical master in the poem. Cars and whips are the embodiment of his authority and will, and they are also the root of the tragic life of the old horse. The old horse has long been exhausted and stumbling. Not only can it not rest in the sun in winter and shade in summer, but it is also forced to undertake this heavy duty. The greedy shopkeeper ignored the unbearable pain under overload and the goods piled up like mountains. What can the old horse say about this kind of hard labor? It didn't say a word anyway! Perhaps, it has struggled and resisted, but in the face of this unchangeable fate, what is the role? The spirit has long been exhausted, and bearing the burden of humiliation is the only nature left to us by life. Besides, there is no extravagant hope. It just "hangs its head heavily" under the pressure of life! The trolley will move forward when it is loaded. But I don't know what is waiting for me ahead, whether it is steep slope or rapids, muddy or potholes. I don't know when this bitter journey is a stop. Where to find support, help or comfort, relief is still unknown. Lonely old horse, "only swallow your tears in your heart"! In tears, the whip came. It instinctively raised its head from confusion and "looked forward", but it was still a long journey and endless pain. Different people have different views on what this miserable and hopeless old horse represents. The poet thinks that he wrote it himself. In fact, I'm afraid the content summarized in the poem will be richer and more extensive. Cang Kejia's successful lyric poems often rely on creating symbolic images to express emotions, evaluate life and express his aesthetic impulse under the impact of real life. This image is indeed a copy of a natural scenery, but it is obviously different from natural scenery, because it emphasizes a certain side and a certain feature, and after screening, it abandons some sides and features. This artistic treatment of screening, highlighting and abandoning is also a typical process from concrete to abstract, from individual to general. The feelings of poetry, after such treatment, are like a laser beam concentrated in one direction, gathering more amazing penetration and external tension. As a result, the description and chanting of this scene has been further developed in depth and breadth, becoming a symbolic artistic image with strong radiation and penetration, and has gained a very wide extension. The old horse is such an example. The poem really describes a real and ordinary old horse; But what the poet deliberately highlights and emphasizes is its situation and personality: silently enduring the hardships of life, full of pain and nowhere to tell, hopeless. Not only the unique situation and character of this old horse. In the whole old social mechanism, the hierarchical system of class oppression forced all members of society to enter the pyramid network structure of "there are ten days in the sky and ten people in the earth". Those humble people have only the obligation to give their children's jade to the people above to invite them to accept and enjoy it, but have no right to struggle or moan and complain, let alone to safeguard their dignity and freedom and equality. How can they feel the weight of the heavy yoke around their necks from time to time? When the situation and character of the old horse are artistically highlighted in the poem from this angle, it also obtains an extremely wide analogy and becomes the carrier of countless people with similar situations and personalities. A short poem also has the ability to overload. This may be the multi-layer radiation of the poet's feelings in the process of creation, or the multi-directional radiation of this symbolic image in the process of appreciation, or the result of the interaction of the two radiations. In short, the typicality is unprecedentedly enhanced, the connotation is unprecedentedly expanded, and the emotional expression is dignified and rich. All those who are suffering from serious disasters and struggling under the heavy shackles of life, but have nothing to say and no future, can probably find their own figure from this image, arousing long or short or sharp or deep * * * sounds in their hearts. From the bad luck of an old horse, people clearly see the author's mood and even the tragic fate of hundreds of millions of farmers. The short eight-line poem summarizes such profound and rich tragic historical content throughout the ages and shows the artistic typicality of the poet. Goethe believes that poetry should "show generality from this particularity" (Goethe's talk), and Liu Zhiji advocates "seeing one thing in a sentence and three corners outside the word" (Shi Tong's narrative), all of which are based on the principle of artistic typification. "Old Horse" provides a very convincing example for this proposition from the art.
2. The Old Horse is a poem written by the modern poet Cang Kejia in April 1932. On the surface, this poem is about an old horse, which is under pressure and suffering and has to struggle under the whip. In fact, it is about the suffering of farmers in the old society. This poem, with its serious and persistent attitude towards life and dignified and simple style, stands in the long river of history, paving the way for the poet's realistic creation and laying the foundation for the continuous development of China's new poetry.