sensei

In breath the stroke
out breath the resting

brush. At each ingress
you push: delve deeper

press, into bamboo’s
clustered crush

climb across the vein
of winter’s eye and

wrest the furious
persimmon’s blush

Outside the snow gave
Manhattan its own hush

and slush. Dirty grey and
feathered as memory’s

sudden rush. Thirty
five summers later

you are still here at
the corner of then

and now, nearly
ninety but still feisty

forbidding all
help as you hang 

 eyes of koans
 lush lunar suns

Dedicated to Sensei Koho Yamamoto, my Sumi- E teacher.