The Long River -- Poems by Hsieh Hsu-Sheng

【Book Introduction】 //In the days to come In the days to come--drink more water. Eat healthily. And Wake early, sleep early To make myself a little more subdued --From "Never"// //You still remind me-- One can hope, or Be without hope, as I gaze at the stars beyond My soul is lighter than I am --From "Ten Preludes"// The debut poetry collection from young Taiwanese poet Hsieh Hsu-Sheng. This collection gathers over 80 poems from the poet's journey in writing, including award-winning pieces, works published on major literary platforms, and those shared privately. His verses are consistently precise and surprisingly striking, navigating in and out of language, and transcending its limitations. He moves between the surface imagery and deeper metaphors of words, exploring the origins of life, questioning the true nature of existence, and delving into despair and vitality within personal emotions. Eschewing clichés and superficial resonance, his work penetrates the depths of the reader's soul and memory, leaving its mark. Recommended by Tsai Lin-Sen and Tsang Kam-Yin Hsu-Sheng's poetry possesses a distinct posture of pursuit. It patiently navigates the materiality of words, their phonetics, and their propositions and pseudo-propositions, following the "first journey to a distant land" and walking on the "road home." --Tsai Lin-Sen (Taiwanese Poet) "The Long River" is a river with no visible outlet. Facing life, emotion, death, and memory, each poem acts as an erosion, where intermittent flows and sudden floods alternate, traversing language to ultimately seep into the bodies and consciousness of others, and even into the cold, unfeeling universe. Hsieh Hsu-Sheng employs calm imagery, yet it harbors intense longing and solitude; the latent sorrow and the force of self-inflicted wounds are interdependent, language becoming the driving force that flows with consciousness, unbound, stranding the reader in a vast, boundless wasteland, gazing at the river's source, reading sorrow. --Tsang Kam-Yin (Hong Kong Poet, author of "The Four Noble Truths") 【Author Biography】 Hsieh Hsu-Sheng arrived in the winter of 1987. Born in Hsinchu, Taiwan. Later resided in Tainan, Beijing, Kyoto, and elsewhere; current whereabouts unknown. He has received awards such as the Hong Kong Young Writers' Award and the Workers' Literary Award. In Taiwan, he founded the poetry journal "Power Dog Face" and, in a casual manner, serves as an editor without being an editor.