1978年底除了是地下文學刊物《今天》亮相登場的時刻，對北島的新詩創作來說，亦是詩人在《北島詩選》（1986）裡設下的，第一個寫作階段的底限。1979年《今天》大張旗鼓之時，北島於1978年以前的政治詩作仍然適用，詩人亦暫時將筆觸導向款款的情詩創作，展現出更為精確且精美的詩歌語言。只是在書寫柔軟情詩之際，中國社會的波動仍不時牽動著北島的創作關懷，一向關注於中國社會的北島，最終仍選擇帶著他的詩回到現實世界裡，梳理存在與自由、現在與未來以及一代人與一個人的細密糾葛。

The success of Bei–Dao in the underground magazine Jin-Tian in 1978 made his earlier political poems written before 1978 a fad. But Bei-Dao did not lose in fame. His political poems became more and more popular though the poet changed his focus to love poetry. However, the love poetry was still not Bei-Dao’s destination. The politics of Contemporary China always attracted Bei-Dao to do or to say something for his people. When Bei-Dao concentrated his poems on the reality of Chinese society, he started to rethink about the duty of a poet like himself.