Po Chü-i

Then the high time of Chinese poetry gives us a number of greats — to name just a few, moving from around the sixth to the 11th century: Tu Fu, Wang Wei, Han Shan, Li Ho, Po Chu-I.

In “A Message to Po Chu-I,” the poet becomes the custodian of an ancient tradition but has no one to pass it along to.

He rendered the poems of such classic Chinese writers as Su Tung-p’o, Po Chu-I and Du Fu and the Japanese poets Ryokan and Masaoka Shiki in a contemporary idiom informed by his wide reading in modern American poetry.

Honouring the variety of his imaginative roots and legacies, Prince drew inspiration from Greek myth, Hasidic Judaism, African folklore, British history, Rennaissance art and the 8th-century Chinese poet Po Chü-i.

Po Chü-i, A.D. 772-846, was a very prolific poet.