The Scarf

First published on the Ekphrastic Assimilations website [site discontinued; now see Ryan James Fine Arts] in the summer of 2016. Originally written in August of 2016 for the Ekphrastic Assimilations exhibit at VALA Eastside art center in Redmond, Washington. Read more about the context and origin of this poem.

The scarf at your neck

       tugs in the wind—

              not from clouds

                     but from your dance

                            the calligraphy of home

                                   this way, that way

                                          like no one’s watching

                                                 but me.


               We were together

            when Kaz danced

         with the brush as large as a boy,

      paper on the floor

   beneath his bare feet.

Before the waltz

       he studied the void

              leaned this way

                     and that

              his eyes closed

       his hands nothing

but t’ai chi gesture.

   Then he hoisted the brush

      soaked with black

         a mop from a pail

            and danced like no one

               could see.


                                                 You wear that crimson scarf

                                          like a warrior

                                   to hide the fear

                            that someone will see your scar.

                     But soon you will dance

              everywhere

       always dance

like no one will ever see.


“In a Chinese Temple” — photograph by Li Li (李笠)