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Wei Ying-wu (737–792) was born in Ch’ang-an into a well-connected family and was allowed to serve in a number of minor posts without having to pass the civil service exam. After the usual ups and downs, he ended his career as the prefect of a series of towns along the lower reaches of the Yangtze, where he wrote this poem. Wei’s poetry is often compared to that of the country poet T’ao Yuan-ming (365–427), who lived in the middle reaches of the Yangtze in what was once the state of Ch’u, and who was the model for many who yearned for a life of simplicity. But Ch’u was also the home of the great shaman-poet Ch’u Yuan (340–278 B.C.), who chose moral purity over adapting to the ever-changing Tao. As his friend returns to his post in Ch’u, Wei wonders which of these paths his friend will take. In the first two lines, Wei answers his friend’s question concerning the direction of his own life. Wei says he has stopped reading the Yiching (Book of Changes) and cultivating a life of solitude. Now, instead of trying to predict change, he simply accepts whatever comes, like the gulls. According to a story in Liehtzu: 2.11, gulls only relax around those who don’t harbor thoughts of catching them. This was the third of three poems.

In Reply to Li Huan

WEI YING-WU

I left the Yiching in the woods

now I drift with the gulls by the stream

among the singers of the ways of Ch’u

to whom do you most often turn