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Wang Xiaoyu's favorite bedtime routine now is to reach for her smartphone and play a poem. Every night at 10 pm, the 32-year-old sales executive in Shanghai logs on to a poetry-sharing group on the social network WeChat and listens to or reads a poem.

It has become a regular pastime ever since she discovered the group, whose Chinese name literally translates to "Read a poem before you sleep".

"At first I felt the poetry helped me relax and made me calm, but I gradually discovered that joining the group also let me connect with people who share the same passion," Wang says.

Like many of the 40,000 subscribers of the account, Wang used to write poems when she was in college, but gave it up after she started working. Having a family and raising a child left her little time or energy to get creative.

"Read a poem" was initiated by Fan Zhi-xing in March 2013. He had intended to make it a romantic way to express and connect, by reading a poem "to the one you care and love for", in this age where relationships are both advantaged and disadvantaged by virtual connections. He started the ball rolling with a Chinese translation of Crossing the Bar by English poet Alfred Tennyson.

More and more found out about the poetry account and started to join the discussions, and shared poems. By early 2014, group members had already shared more than 300 poems of a wide range of genres.

Subscribers soon grew beyond Fan's personal network, and volunteers joined an editing team to select works to be sent out through the account.

An introduction posted on the poetry-sharing group tells newcomers that "poems will not erase the wrinkles on your face, but they will keep your heart young".

"It all started from a private emotional need, but it so happened that it also answered the inner callings of many others," Fan says.

A poet himself, Fan says he believes poetry is not distanced from the fast pace of modern life. Not so long ago, poetry societies flourished in China's universities and high schools, and even with the far-reaching influence of the Internet, a poet at that time would still find a large and appreciative following through books, magazines or even hand-written copies.

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