page_title: Geese in Chinese poetry
hierarchical_section_title: Geese in Chinese poetry
context_page_description: Geese are an important motif in Chinese poetry. Examples of goose imagery have an important place in Chinese poetry ranging from the Shijing and the Chu Ci poets through the poets of Han poetry and later poets of Tang poetry such as Li Bai, Wang Wei, Du Fu, and the Xiaoxiang poetry, especially in the poetry of the Song dynastic era. Various poetic concepts could be communicated by the inclusion of the imagery of geese in a poem, and the understanding of allusions to a goose or geese can help provide key insights into the poems of Classical Chinese poetry. Chinese sources typically distinguish between two types of geese, the domestic goose, and the wild goose: of the two, the wild goose is the more important for poetry, whether as significant of migratory seasonal change, or as "bearing a message of love from afar", by persons separated by a great distance, or as the "lone goose", bereft of both mate and flock.
context_section_description: Geese (genus Anser) are an important motif in Chinese poetry. Examples of goose imagery have an important place in Chinese poetry ranging from the Shijing and the Chu Ci poets through the poets of Han poetry and later poets of Tang poetry such as Li Bai, Wang Wei, Du Fu, and the Xiaoxiang poetry, especially in the poetry of the Song dynastic era. Various poetic concepts could be communicated by the inclusion of the imagery of geese in a poem, and the understanding of allusions to a goose or geese can help provide key insights into the poems of Classical Chinese poetry. Chinese sources typically distinguish between two types of geese, the domestic goose, and the wild goose: of the two, the wild goose is the more important for poetry, whether as significant of migratory seasonal change, or as "bearing a message of love from afar", by persons separated by a great distance (generally north and south, since that is how geese generally migrate), or as the "lone goose", bereft of both mate and flock.
caption: Geese Descending on a Sandbank. Their legs are highlighted with color. By Bian Shoumin (also, Weijian Laoren or Yigong, 1684–1752). According to the MFAH Website, Bian's inscribed poem reads:  
  Just now wild geese came into the sky,        
  
  As I waved my brush before the master of the qin [zither];    
  
  Autumn sounds meld with autumn thoughts     
  
  As I stand beside I know not who.
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