Appreciation of Jia Sheng's Poems

Jiasheng is an epic poem written by Li Shangyin, a poet in the Tang Dynasty, which satirizes the present through the ancient times. It is intended to express the poet's feelings of lack of talents through Jia Yi's experience. Its focus is not on personal gains and losses, but on pointing out that feudal rulers can't really attach importance to talents and make them play a role in politics. In the poem, Emperor Wendi was called to Jia Yi's propaganda room and talked until midnight. It is written that Wendi can't know sages and benevolence. "Don't ask ordinary people, ask ghosts and gods" reveals the fatuous characteristics of the late Tang emperor who sought immortality with medicine and abandoned politics regardless of people's livelihood. This poem is full of irony, profound and powerful. While sympathizing with Jia Yi's talent, he expressed the sadness that the author himself was politically excluded and his ambition was hard to pay.