Cyril Birch’s important position in the history of American sinology and his outstanding contribution to the history of Sino-foreign cultural exchange have made him a hot spot for domestic and international research. However, his translation of Chinese poetry, as an important part of his sinological studies, has not received due attention from scholars in China and abroad. Therefore, this paper will be centered on Anthology of Chinese Literature, explain Cyril Birch’s concept of Chinese poetry, and the characteristics of his translation of Chinese poetry. The study finds that Cyril Birch believes that the development of Chinese poetry can be divided into eight stages of development, with different creative styles and stylistic characteristics at different stages; Cyril Birch’s translations of ancient poems focus on showing the poet’s bitter and helpless state of mind and try to convey the audiovisual effect of the original poems; his translations of modern poems focus on showing the rhythmic characteristics.