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) launched an era where vernacular Chinese was for the first time 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.

The editor and translators at 21st Century Chinese Poetry are committed to translating poets from across China who would otherwise remain virtually unknown to Western audiences.

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.

A REPOSE

Since summer of 2023, Meifu has turned her focus to her own poetry and to poetry from other parts of the world. Please continue to visit this website and read the poems we translated over the years. Meifu is also in the process of updating the old numbers of 21st Century Chinese Poetry (No.1 - No. 15) and add them to "POEMS 2000-2015" on this website.

You can read some of Meifu's poems here:
Dirt Road
Water Droplets
Windborne
Song of Sleep<
To Father
Dirge
The Simple Thing Called Love
Reading Baudelaire Into the Night
Sea Crag
To Melville
London Blues

POEM OF THE DAY     一天一首诗

WHEN THE WIND SWEEPS ACROSS GUIYANG

• by Zhao Weifeng


• A gusty wind sweeps across Guiyang as if staging a guerrilla war.
• But, all is fair play.
• To start, he tries to look as perky as possible,
• emulating the blooming trees and flowers. The year before,
• the moon even came to cheer him on.
• If you can judge who is more bright-eyed and bushy-tailed
• - the wind or the moon -
• you should be able to predict
• the winner of the battle between
• muted memories and lurid realities.
• Spring wind hovers and sweeps across the board — across cities and villages,
• across tower blocks, chopping boards, keyboards, across you and me.
• It goes where it pleases, even though most people
• cannot see the wind is actually going through different phases,
• from wild to violent to frail.
• You say some winds have too many escapades.
• You say some winds still have more to ride out.
• You say a few of them will
• end up as unsolved mysteries,
• and most will die young in the same old fashion.
• You say a certain person, no less than a demigod,
• snuck in with the wind at night,
• stayed briefly
• and soon became the past,
• a sorrowful past.


• Translated by Meifu Wang, Johan Ramaekers & Michael Soper

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.

  

Zhao Weifeng 赵卫峰

b. 1970s

Zhao Weifeng is a descendent of the Bai ethnic minority in Guizhou Province. He is a member of The Chinese Writers’ Association. A poet and literary critic, he is the editor of an independent literary magazine All Things About Poetry. He lives in Guiyang.

赵卫峰，白族。20世纪70年代生，贵州人。诗人、评论家。中国作协会员。现居贵阳。曾被评为“改革开放30周年‘贵州省十大影响力诗人’”，曾获贵州省政府文艺奖等。现编民刊《诗歌杂志》等。

Read Zhao Weifeng's poem: When the Wind Sweeps Across Guiyang.