Contours in Cathay

Directions closely read

Directions closely read
Inflections heard where tread
Fingers characters follow
From clouded peaks
to flowered hollows
Hands which petals hold
Restrained their stories told
Of what is lost and where to seek.

T.P. Wilkinson, Dr. rer. pol. writes, teaches History and English, directs theatre and coaches cricket between the cradles of Heine and Saramago. He is author of Unbecoming American: A War Memoir and also Church Clothes, Land, Mission and the End of Apartheid in South Africa. Read other articles by T.P..