"When I was 21," Xiang Yang explains, "I was exploring the expressions, phonology and rhythms of Taiwanese, and I was figuring out how to put its sounds into writing. I was not so much finding the language of poetry as drawing an outline of my life history-so that what had been a silent Taiwan noisily rushed into my young life, enlightening and tempering it."
向陽表示：「21 歲的我，推敲著台語的聲韻、節奏、用語以及文字表述時，與其說我找到了詩的語言，不如說我構連了生命的歷史圖式，當年沉默的台灣轟然走入我年輕的生命，開啟我，且錘鍊我。」