Wu-ti of Han

Wu-ti (157–87 BC) was the sixth emperor of the Han dynasty and came to the throne when he was only sixteen. His “Autumn Wind” is the poem of an emperor on his state barge regretting a journey that leaves his mistress behind; when she, Li Fu-jēn, died, Waley tells us, he sent for wizards from all parts of China in the hope of seeing her spirit again.

The poems here are Arthur Waley’s versions in A Hundred and Seventy Chinese Poems (1918), given with the poet’s name as spelled in those books.