You can be a scholar or a dunderhead
a gentleman or a rough; either way
you should sign your name - this seal,
that chop, this scroll, it's your own work!
I went to Tai Shan and Lao Shan
and walked up their winding paths.
Now, I can drink my tea and Turkish coffee
and contemplate a future trip to Huangshan
that Yellow Mountain where artists
are long-lived like cypress and pine
hanging from cliffs and making
ink-black calligraphy and landscapes.
Rustic scholars, touching the life and nature
climbing among the peaks and clouds.
A further collection of poems, many from years in the Middle East, but also the California San Francisco and Central Coast areas (Santa Cruz, Carmel, Big Sur, Berkeley, etc.).