這張照片是8年前在美國一個咖啡館進行open mike詩歌表演時所攝，當時（現在也仍然如此）很多咖啡館或酒吧或書店都有詩社，經常和音樂表演一起，每星期定期活動。大家都是有話要說，有感而發，聚到一起，在台上表達釋放自己，對周圍觀眾也是極好的現場藝術體驗，溝通帶來享受或震動或淨化或思考。這是真正的自發的社區人心的草根藝術，“人民的聲音”，Spoken word，詩人之間，詩人和樂手之間相互唱和，還有競賽鼓動，經常場麵爆滿，激動人心。我那一整年，背著一大包寫作材料，往來於各個咖啡館社區詩社，加入這樣的美國民間的自由表演表達。當時我剛開始畫油畫半年多，轉化脫出以前對於書法的包括中西兩方麵的“傳統體驗認識”深層問題框限，經過之前多年的西方文學哲學和基本人性道德方麵探索，正在經曆一場心靈的大解放和溝通，太多話要說，對象不論“中西”，太多感想鬱積和思想認識的“結”要疏通宣泄清理，所謂情動於中而形於言，言之不足嗟歎之，嗟歎之不足故永歌之，永歌之不足，不知手之舞之，足之蹈之。所在城市音樂工業很發達，其音樂詩歌氛圍剛好提供這個自由通轉環境，一個星期“轉戰”幾處，一兩個星期寫一首詩，寫完之後背下來，刻在腦中，通過表演和舞蹈變成身軀的活的語言，推動自己的轉化“進化”往前走，視情況有時還要配上音樂，詩從吟誦變成吟唱，到後來自己開始寫歌作曲弄樂器，其實也隻是回歸藝術相通的本來麵目。以下是我當時邊吟詠邊舞蹈自己所寫的一首詩，Ask me not where I am from（不要問我從哪裏來）
這張黑白照片是81或82年浙江日報上刊登的我小學時第一次獲全國少兒書法比賽一等獎後受邀去其他學校表演書法時所攝
這是8年多前開始畫油畫時所作，以手的描摩來接通我內心之光與我眼所見外在世界之光，尋得我對透視的精神的理解，當時用的還是我那10年自學書法時的“簽名”。從書法表演到油畫和英文詩歌表演，這“傳統”功夫的翻譯解放轉換，可謂“此身似曆茫茫海，一顆驪珠乍得時”。
Ask Me Not Where I Am From
Ask me not where I come from
I will tell you I come from the past
And I have paid my dues to the past
I will say no more about what you think you know,
knowing I could add no more to the filled box
the box you made for yourself labelled the Chinese
Filled with what I call the past
I ask you to see me
I ask you to ask no more for my name and the next minute call me by the name of another Chinese
For you never saw me nor this other Chinese, you saw only a shadow among shadows, a copy among copies,
You saw only my back
You saw your own blind spot masked by my Chinese face
And I emerge from the shadows into the light,
I turned my back on the beaten track
I take the road untravelled
I go down the path of becoming, becoming the original Chinese
I cut my own path, I make my own words, I mould my own true face like a shining mask
The original Chinese is an artist creating herself
The original Chinse is a poet announcing herself
The original Chinese is a dancer of her unparalleled steps
The original Chinese is a warrior for no one but herself first
The original Chinese is a demon of creativity,
The original Chinese is the genius of nature
I will not fit in your box labeled Chinese
Oh I feel the smallness of your box, Oh I can’t breathe in this box
For my name is freedom
I cannot be bound
Or is it a box in my own mind? For how can your box bind me if I had not accepted the bondage in myself?
Well, let me smash it, let me burst it open
Let me explode it first in me and then in you, or perhaps between me and you, or between me and myself? Or perhaps between you and yourself? Or perhaps between me, just like you, and this world, this life? Or perhaps between me and this air around me and this ground under my feet?
Yes I will not be shackled by anyone or anything or any idea in me or outside me,
I feel my warm blood rises in me strong like the river of life
I am reborn in this life for fresh air and largeness of action
My coming is the spirit reunited with flesh
My arrival is the breakthrough from the element of water into the element of fire
My advent from the past to the future shakes up times and minds
As I make my way through, light rays of seven colors sparkle like music from the rubbing and friction of different elements and worlds and minds
I am as innocent and sweet, wild and free like the lion and gazelle running on the prairie, like the birds flying in the air, like the trees and grass and flowers growing in the sun and wind
Oh let nothing come between me and the earth and sky
For I am the retrograde, younger than when I was young
I am the true rebel
I am the spirit of freedom
I am the original Chinese
Oh what brand new sensation will my coming to the world bring to me?
Oh what freshness and cleanness will my coming bring to you, world?
Will you be the same with and without me, world?
Know me, know me anew, world
As I know you anew, world
I don’t believe the world is the same with and without me
I leap onto this solid ground from the airy tower of infinite height and the darkest of the underworld
I land here, I shake the earth
So feel me, feel my repercussion, feel my collision as from a moving planet, feel my heartbeat, feel my touch, feel my warm body, feel my kicks and fists, feel my words and sounds, feel my breath in this air you breathe
What will my truthful coming disclose to your eye, world?
What truthful face will you show me, world?
Let us forget where you and I come from, I don’t care where you come from and you don’t really care where I come from
Let us meet here and now
Let not where I come from nor where you come from come between us
For that is where you and I come from in separation in the past, not where we are now, the meeting ground
Let us make some space for now
Let us make some space for here
Let us make some space for our meeting ground
