158 CHINESE LITERATURE
The butterfly flutters from flower to flower, The dragon-fly sips and springs lightly away,
Each creature is merry its brief little hour, So let us enjoy our short life while we may?
Here is a specimen of his skill with the "stop-short," based upon a disease common to all Chinese, poets or otherwise, nostalgia :
" White gleam the gulls across the darkling tide,
On the green hills the red flowers seem to burn; Alas ! I see another spring has died. . . . When will it come the day of my return ? "
Of the poet CHANG CH'IEN not much is known. He graduated in 727, and entered upon an official career, but ultimately betook himself to the mountains and lived as a hermit. He is said to have been a devotee of Taoism. The following poem, however, which deals with dhydna, or the state of mental abstraction in which all desire for existence is shaken off, would make it seem as if his leanings had been Buddhistic. It gives a per- fect picture, so far as it goes, of the Buddhist retreat often to be found among mountain peaks all over China, visited by pilgrims who perform religious exercises or fulfil vows at the feet of the World-Honoured, and by contemplative students eager to shake off the " red dust " of mundane affairs :
" The clear dawn creeps into the convent old, The rising sun tips its tall trees with gold, As, darkly, by a winding path I reach DhydnJs hall, hidden midst fir and beech. Around these hills sweet birds their pleasure take, Man's heart as free from shadows as this lake; Here worldly sounds are hushed, as by a spell, Save for the booming of the altar belly
There can be little doubt of the influence of Buddhism
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