Is a perfect creation.
Equal to oneself
Please pay attention to its limitations.
Completely filled with
Pebble meaning
His scent won't remind anyone of anything.
It won't scare anything away, and it won't arouse desire.
Its smell and cold
Just and full of dignity
When I hold it,
Deeply regret
Its noble body
Permeated by the wrong temperature
Pebbles will not be tamed
In the end, they will all look at us.
With calm and clear eyes
Make an appreciative comment
Reading Pebble, a poem by Polish poet Zbignev Herbert, we can understand the complete meaning of self.
The poem begins with a calm tone: "Pebble is a perfect creation". "Perfect" is a word with extreme meaning, and it seems that it should not be used to decorate pebbles. Pebbles are so common that the strange combination of the word reminds people of pebbles. But the poet immediately stopped this conjecture and explained the meaning of "perfection" in four sections. The perfection of pebble lies in its equality with itself, which breaks people's expectation of perfection. All kinds of additional meanings of perfection in the eyes of the world have been deleted by the poet, who emphasized that the perfection of pebble lies in that it is pebble, not anything else. The poet endowed Pebble with rational personality by paying attention to its limitations. Pebble knows his limitations and his boundaries. It uses reason to control itself and ensure its integrity. "Just full" means that Pebble does not want to be more self-sufficient to expand its boundaries to increase itself, nor does it want to reduce itself because of any factors. In short, it must be completely equal to itself to ensure its complete self-sufficiency. Then the poet further explained the self-meaning of Pebble from the relationship between Pebble and others.
Pebble is not isolated from the world, and its existence is bound to be related to others, but Pebble has not changed in this connection, and it has guaranteed its zero influence in its contact with others. Its smell (translated as "aroma" seems inappropriate, the aroma is a little strong, it should be the following "smell") does not remind people of anything, others see itself. The crown doesn't scare anything away. It has no threat and no authoritative image. It will not even arouse the desire of others, nor will it be possessed or defiled.
These three negative sentences are reminiscent of several negative sentences in milosz's Gift (milosz may be influenced by these three negative sentences). However, Herbert's denial is natural. He expressed it from the perspective of others, while milosz expressed it himself. At this point, the paving of poetry is very solid, and when revealing another meaning of pebbles, it strips the personality meaning of "justice" and "full of dignity" from the existing state of pebbles that "smells cold". But the "coldness" of pebbles can lead to misunderstanding, and the poet expresses his shallowness with regret and shame.
The poet felt sympathy when he saw the coldness of pebbles. He wanted to warm pebbles with his own hands, which destroyed the coldness of pebbles and made their bodies "infiltrated by a false temperature". He saw pebbles' "calm and clear eyes" looking at him. From this kind of eyes, the poet understands that transmitting warmth from the outside is also a tame form, thus truly understanding the meaning of pebbles.
Herbert lived in a totalitarian era. When he thinks about individual personality, he thinks about how to stick to himself. He found a reason not to be tamed from the ordinary image of pebbles, small and hard. The reflective part of poetry has practical significance. People who live in the non-totalitarian era may not get the meaning of "not being tamed" from the image of Pebble, but what Pebble expresses is a complete self, but it has eternal significance.