Ars Poetica
        Lu Ji (261-303)

General, minister, poet,
you never had a chance . . .
A brush at the tip of your mind
touched the eight borders
of the world, all the seas—
you recognized that
there are many styles,
but that the mind
requires precision.

The Wen Fu—your treatise
on the art of writing—
was too dazzling
for a jealous court,
and you were undone
by political intrigue
midway in life.
Your last night on earth
was spent wondering
if you would ever again
hear the cranes
of your home
in Huading?

There is an ode
for each cloud,
all the heavens to fill
with the unflagging attention
of the heart.
                A wise man
would give his life
to this instead
of the skills of war,
if he could just let
ambition drift away. . . .

Every night now,
the shifting stars
remind me
that we are alone
on the earth, no matter
what we say.

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from The Louisville Review
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