Recognition

You took red kites
and flew them from
Tibetan hillsides;
folkdancing on blue glass
captive moths
chained to mountain air.
Then you cut their cords:
hard, like suicide.
Just to watch the
red birds
soaring free.
And you walked bitter streets,
their walls of smoking steel:
saw progress in its tortured
reach for heaven,
chimneys kneeling
in drunken prayer.
And yet
in this hardened land
you found flowers,
sweet daisies;
sanctuary and home,
a temple in Tokyo.

You don't have to tell her
who you are, or where you've been:
this stranger knows.
She's been with you
all along.

November, 1995