Abstract: China is always a country of poetry. Since the May 4th New Cultural Movement, especially since 1949, the “old style poetry” has almost disappeared in the narration of “the history of modern literature” because of the dominant doctrine that “the history of modern Chinese literature is the history of the development of new literature”. But as a matter of fact, while the new style poetry developed vigorously, the creation of different kinds of old style poetry had not ever stopped, and the old style poetry embodied its own unique value in the 20th century. The poetry written by Zhao Puchu, a later Buddhist leader, is a good example. Zhao wrote over 2000 works including various types of old style poetry and antithetical couplet in his life. Due to his continuous innovation in the style and content, his poetry displays another kind of modernity different from that in the new style poetry, namely, “the poeticization of daily life” and “the aestheticization of religious life”. Therefore, we can conclude that the old style poetry, as far as its surviving in modern times and its modern artistic spirit is concerned, do have its “modernity”. They should not be neglected in the history of modern Chinese literature in the 20th century.