Coming from paddy fields, lime tiles under rain
glazed with wind, the protected courtyard
rectangular, the ritual space of ages
once clipped and clopped past sliding door
past grass, along paths, by stuccoed mud wall
to tea and tobacco shared on earthen floor.
Moving to heart stones, smoked words under beams
washed by monsoon, the boarded frame
parallel, the empty interior of feudalism
once rested against timbered craft
against the hipped roof, by red lattice window
to cypress and cedar grown under sun and snow.
Passing by ancestral altars, past silkworms bred
past straw in corners, by gables brown
bamboo and clay sorrows held in peasant hands
light and air still boxed across ancient lands.
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