These are unusual times. These poets are tale-tellers of their world.              (All rights reserved. 2026)
  • I am waiting in the land of poetry. waiting in hope for its clanging sounds and forceful roaring past! -Ren Xianqing, Issue 1
  • Now we are on board, let's not bring up any depressing topics; no more debates about the pet peeves in those capitalist countries.

THE JOURNAL OF 21st Century Chinese Poetry 《廿一世纪中国诗歌》is an independent journal committed to showcasing the best of contemporary Chinese poetry. We exist to discover and celebrate poetry and the Chinese poets who write them with the largest possible Anglophone audience.

In the early twentieth century, The May Fourth Movement (1917-1921) opened the door for vernacular Chinese to be accepted as a legitimate poetic voice. This was followed by an outpouring of verse written in 'plain speech' by people from all walks of life in contrast to the classical, elitist poetic forms of imperial China.

A century has now passed since these 'new' poetic voices emerged. Vernacular poetry has continued to blossom in poetry journals and in cyberspace.

21st Century Chinese Poetry aims to carry that tradition further: translating poets from across China for readers who would otherwise never encounter them.

Please send all enquiries, suggestions and corrections regarding 21st Century Chinese Poetry to Meifu Wang at:

editor@modernchinesepoetry.com

Founder and Editor
Meifu Wang



A TASTE OF CONTEMPORARY CHINESE POETRY

From 2012 to 2015, our team worked with a group of Chinese poets in China to introduce contemporary Chinese poetry to the wider world. We translated the works of 66 contemporary Chinese poets into English and broadcast them on this website and in print (ISSN 2166-3688).

From 2018 to 2022, we further collaborated with China's Poetry Journal (诗刊) to bring a selection of their monthly publication to world-wide readers. Poetry Journal (Beijing, China）was founded in 1957, with an emphasis on the publication of contemporary Chinese poetry as well as classical poetry by living poets. It is the widest-circulated poetry journal in China.

Circulating more than sixty years, the journal has brought together and introduced a great number of poets, reflecting many of the sweeping changes that the country has witnessed over that period.







WHERE THINGS STAND NOW

For a decade, this website has been a labour of love of the editor, out of devotion to poetry and poets, to bring contemporary Chinese poetry to English-speaking readers.

Since summer of 2023, Meifu has turned her attention to her own poetry and to poetry from other parts of the world. Please continue to explore the poems translated here over the years. Meifu is also gradually updating the earlier issues of 21st Century Chinese Poetry (No.1 - No. 15) and adding them to poems "from Other Journals". Meifu also continues to meet with Chinese poets periodically, in China or overseas, to explore ways to add new poems to this website.

You can read some of Meifu's poems here: Go to Meifu's Poems




POEM OF THE DAY     一天一首诗

VOICES OF THE CORN

  • by Han Zongfu

  • Sooner or later Autumn will come to seal the corn's lips
  • with hoarfrost — side by side, all hushed,
  • heads bent, untiring eyes fixed on the earth.
  • But a few refuse to be voiceless, calm and unwavering,
  • raising their heads to watch the birds
  • as autumn wind hollows out the entire plain.

  • Oh, Corn, you ride together in old Bachelor Hou's wagon,
  • hand in hand, glowing with wild exuberance,
  • thanking Autumn, thanking the yellow earth, thanking Mister Hou.
  • Oh, Mister Hou, your draft horse is as good as a wife,
  • wizening for you till the end, heartbreaking to see.

  • Shoes soak up October rain and hurry the legs
  • to finish their journeys. These corn are a band of rovers
  • without the freedom to rove; still too green to burn like torches.
  • Deeper into autumn, they are farther and farther from home.
  • Can someone as small as me enlighten these purest souls in the plant kingdom?
  • How can I lead them on life's great expedition?

  • I once dreamt of cornfields after cornfields,
  • all basking in the warmth of the sun.
  • Indeed there was a light shining on the great land,
  • a light raised high by a great mind.

  • Deep at night, the ants still hustle, the grasshoppers are on patrol,
  • a lovely moon oversees the plain. The corn and I,
  • we love and are loved like all mortals, and dream a small dream.
  • On the road in this desolate world, I am forced to admit:
  • My heart, sealed up by autumn frost,
  • is the heart of the corn; my body, burning wild at night,
  • is the body of the corn.

  • Translated by Meifu Wang, Michael Soper & Guy Hibbert

  • This poem was originally written in Chinese and published in Poetry Journal (Beijing, China); its English translation first appeared on this website and simultaneously in China via WeChat (微信).

    We encourage you to read this poem as an exercise of slow reading.



      

    Han Zongfu 韩宗夫

    b. 1966

    Han Zongfu was born in Zhucheng, Shandong Province. He now lives in a river town along Wei River in Shandong Province. He has published two poetry books: The Villages of Scarecrows, and The Mirror that Has Gone Missing.

    韩宗夫：1966年生于山东诸城。1986年开始习作，1993年在潍河边的一个小镇上定居至今。有作品散见《诗刊》《北京文学》《散文》《草原》等。曾获《山东文学》2006~2010年度诗歌奖、首届中国（乐至）田园诗歌奖。著有诗集《稻草人的村庄》《走丢的镜子》。

    Han Zongfu's poems can be read here: Voices of the Corn.