Farmers have no leisure all year round, and they are even busier in May.
A warm south wind blew at night, and the wheat in the field was covered with ridges and ripe yellow.
Women carry food in baskets, and children carry jars full of water and soup.
Men accompany them to deliver meals in the fields and work in Nanshan.
The feet were smoked by the heat on the ground, and the back was baked by the hot sun.
Exhausted, don't feel hot, just cherish summer.
I saw a poor peasant woman, holding her child and following others.
He held the picked ears of wheat in his right hand and hung a broken basket in his left arm.
Listening to her talk about her family made everyone feel sorry for her.
In order to pay taxes, I sold the land and ate my hunger by picking up wheat ears.
What are my advantages now? I have never raised or picked mulberry trees.
The salary is 300 stone a year, and there will be surplus grain at the end of the year.
I am ashamed to think of these things, and I will never forget them day and night.
Looking at Wheat Cutting is an early work of Bai Juyi, a poet in the Tang Dynasty. This poem describes the scene of busy farming during the wheat harvest, criticizes the heavy taxes that cause people's poverty, and feels deeply guilty that the poet can have enough food and clothing without doing anything himself.
It shows the humanitarian spirit of a conscientious feudal official. In writing techniques, the poet combines panoramic description with the description of specific characters, making the whole poem an organic whole.
Extended data:
First, the creative background
Guan Men Mai is a famous satirical poem written by the author in his early years. This poem was written in the first year of Yuanhe in Tang Xianzong (805) to the second year of Yuanhe (806). It was written by Bai Juyi when he was a county magistrate in Ku (now zhouzhi county, Shaanxi Province), feeling that the local people were working hard and living in poverty.
The county commandant is responsible for catching thieves and collecting taxes in the county. It is precisely because Bai Juyi is in charge of this matter that he knows best the disasters suffered by the working people in this regard.
Second, appreciate
This poem is clear in narration, natural in structure, clear in hierarchy and strong in logic. At the beginning of the poem, the background is explained first, indicating that May is the busy farming season for wheat harvest. Then write down that women lead their children to the fields to give food and water to young people who are cutting wheat.
Later, it described young farmers cutting wheat with their heads down in Nangang wheat field, fumigating their feet with the heat, and baking their backs in the hot sun. They are tired and don't feel hot, but they just cherish the long days in summer and can do more work.
At this point, the farmer's hard work has been strongly demonstrated. Then I described another sad scene: a poor woman, with a child in her arms and a broken basket in her hand, was picking wheat by the wheat harvester.
The reason why she wants to pick up wheat is because her family's fields have been sold out and she has to pay official tax. Now there is no land to plant and no wheat to harvest, so she has to pick up wheat to satisfy her hunger.
These two scenes are intertwined, with both differences and connections: the former reveals the hardships of farmers, while the latter reveals heavy taxes. Since heavy taxes have made poor women lose their fields, they will also make this peasant family who is cutting wheat lose their fields.
Today's wheat pickers are yesterday's wheat pickers; Today's wheat harvesters may become tomorrow's wheat harvesters. Strong irony is self-evident. The poet linked the pain of farmers' life with the ease of his own life, feeling ashamed and unable to calm down for a long time.
This lyric text is the essence of the whole poem. It is the product of the author's touching feelings and shows the poet's deep sympathy for the working people. Bai Juyi wrote satirical poems with the aim of "only making people sick, and I hope the emperor knows."
In this poem, he made a sharp contrast between the peasants and himself as a court official with his own personal feelings, that is, he hoped that the "son of heaven" was affectionate and tactful, which could be described as well-intentioned.
References:
Baidu Encyclopedia-View Wheat Cutting