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Wang Ch’i (c. 1150) has left no information about himself other than what can be gathered from a few surviving poems. Ever since Lin Pu (967–1028), aka Lin Ho-ching, began singing the praises of the plum blossom, the flower came to represent a life of simplicity and beauty in the face of adversity. Especially famous were his lines: “Its scattered shadows fall lightly on clear water / its subtle scent pervades the moonlit dusk.” But Wang is concerned that as a result of Lin’s infatuation with the plum, others now exhaust themselves trying to excel him, and that more often than not they fail to understand or to cultivate the plum’s true spirit of purity and simplicity. Lin lived as a recluse on a small island at the edge of Hangchou’s West Lake when the city was still a provincial backwater, long before it became the capital of the Southern Sung dynasty. He never sought public office, never married, and amused himself by teaching cranes to dance. People say the plum was his wife, and the cranes were his children.

The Plum

WANG CH’I

Immune from the slightest contaminating dust

content beside a thatched hut or bamboo fence

then you met Lin Pu by mistake

poets ever since haven’t stopped talking