Daily, I sat hunched over calligraphy
practice sheets. Using water for ink,
my brush traced over the dotted outlines
of characters. Mistakes would dry up fast
and disappear like breath on a glass pane
or soap opera spirits of the dead.
 
And here is my heaven for them: words
of all deformities hanging out in
some bamboo grove to a soundtrack of zither
and streaming water; being wrong a thing
of the past life. Nothing goes to nothing,
eagerness evaporates, my practice stops.  
 
Now my brush hangs from a metal hook, its hairs
grey, dry and split like the head of an old witch.