A scholar's most feared enemy is a broken pen. How can his words flow smooth like the graceful Li River on which he sails downstream? How can he express the beauty of the innumerable karst hills populating the landscape when the very instrument with which he conveys his thoughts and emotions betray him?
Karst hills dot the entire area, rising sharply as cliffs from the very banks of the river, its sheer walls and deep caves carved out ages ago by the river. Karst hills further inland sport weather-beaten rocks that tease his mind and flirt with his imagination. Breaks within the hills give way to ensconced wooden houses sporting curved eaves. An elaborate ancestral hall or temple peeks through the trees. Enticing. Beckoning.
The Tang writer Han Yu wrote of the river:
The river forms a green gauze belt, the mountains are like blue jade hairpins.
He thinks the river is like a jade green snake slithering its way through a forest of karst hills resembling young emerald bamboo shoots.
Overhead, a flock of cormorants fly in formation against the cloudy sky of Guangxi Province. A karst hill rises sheer and steep by the banks, reminiscent of Tolkien's Argonath. Tall and ominous. Foreboding. Forbidding.
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