It's wonderful that this list suddenly leapt alive.  It's equally
wonderful that "eastern" issues prompted the leaping.  About Modernism
and Orientalism in general, I've been reading Robert Kern's book on the
subject (*Modernism, Orientalism, and the American Poem* it's cleverly
titled.)  I find it valuable because Kern's reading sets up a way for
incorporating non-Buddhist, non-Eastern-minded writers (like Cummings
or Stevens for instance) into a "Zen-centric" perspective (to coin a
phrase).  I've been thinking about some products of modern poetry as
being kinds of advertisements before the fact for an American
assimilation/appropriation/utilization of the so-called wisdom of the
east.

(Note please that Kern's book is mainly about Emerson, some 19th-cen.
German philologists, Otto Jespersen, Fenollosa, Pound, and ultimately,
Snyder.  It doesn't speak specifically to Cummings or Stevens, even if
I implied that it did.  It's just helpful for locating modern American
poetic practice in a history of western engagements with, primarily,
the Chinese language.)

Thanks for writing!
-Jon Weidler
Loyola University