Lucky

It's still too early
for the comfort of newborn green,
but underneath the leafless cherry blossom tree
there are bowls of tea for the ones who aren't here.

In warmer times

I first learned how a splash of water

can lift a scent high enough to soothe a spirit.

I'd almost forgotten

those earliest days

of fumbling unfamiliarity

and how quietly something can change

from part of the background

to something inviting 

deeper consideration.

There is a hidden path here.

I discovered it by going around

the obvious delights,

of the stone lanterns, the pond, and the maples,

to a dark and overgrown thicket of bamboo.

Today, 

I make sure to pay my respects

there, remembering the first time

curiosity drew me.

I greet the gods I find here.

This time I understand the reason

for smiles and tears.

I cup my hands around 

the memories that brought me here

warmed by today's tea

under the leafless tree

and give thanks.

How lucky I was.

How lucky I am.

Photo by Hiroshi Tsubono on Unsplash

Song Choice: Everything Stays from Adventure Time

Liner Notes For This Groove: If you came around via Poets and Storytellers United, feel free to skip this part because it's a lot longer than 369 words. Though I am elaborating a bit on the prompt I gave this week, "looking back".

So for the last couple of weeks I've been looking over all my old blog posts. It's been an interesting experience, not just in showing me ways I've changed as a writer. There are a lot of other changes too. Last September, we lost my mom-in-law. She was the bedrock of my husband's side of the family and navigating a post-Ellen world is just plain odd (when it isn't deeply sad). 

Tea with Mom Driks

I don't think I mentioned it on this blog, but we also welcomed another corgi into our family, Jelly Bean. Like my dearly departed Kit, she's a rescue. But she's *ahem* a lot more complicated than he was. I think we've finally got her used to the idea that this is her forever home (but she still thinks the ceiling fan is out to get her).

 

Don't let that cute face fool you. 

She's bossy and anxious.

I quipped on PS&U about the change in my all-time favorite book series. But in a lot of ways that change really does represent a lot of the ways I've changed. I was unaware about lot of things. I'd even say that I was a bit naive. Sure, I still love a generous dose of whimsy and magic. But these days, I relate better to sharply satirical (and hilarious) whimsy that isn't afraid to take a hard look at some of the biggest ways our world is broken. (That the author doesn't appear to be a massive jerk is a bonus too.) There's something to be said for whimsy as an act of defiance.

You will not break me

from Dungeon Crawler Carl

by Matt Dinniman

I think in most ways, I've become more solid in who I've always been. So what seem like changes on the outside feel more like coming home to myself.

One thing that absolutely hasn't changed is my love of tea. This piece was inspired by a recent trip to Shofuso, the Japanese house and garden in Philly. I actually haven't practiced tea there in ages. Of course, I've been practicing tea, but my tea teacher had the space to build a traditional Japanese tea room in her house. When changes occurred that limited our use of the rooms in Shofuso, the students of Philadelphia Urasenke just went to their tea teacher's homes instead (we have multiple teachers, all with their own tea rooms).

The reason for my visit was a bittersweet one. There was a memorial to honor the passing of two senior members of our tea school as well as the passing of Hounsai Hanso Soshitsu, the 15th generation Grand Tea Master of the Urasenke School. I never met the Grand Master, but Keijiroh and Terry were always very warm and kind people, thrilled to share their love of tea. Terry was the one who convinced me to step up and do public demonstrations. I'll be thinking of her at this year's Cherry Blossom festival, when I'll be doing a string of demos all day long.

Here are a few pictures of my visit:

So that's pretty much it for me. Thank you for reading this far! Anything new in your world? Let's talk about it in the comments.

By Rommy Cortez-Driks

Chado

In the sonnet of the ceremony
this restless girl
finds her heart
floating in the moment
water touches tea.

Photo by WELLSTUDIO on Unsplash

By Rommy Cortez-Driks

Song Choice: Yume by Kalaido

Liner Notes for this Groove: This poem was created for Poets and Storytellers United's Friday Writings Prompt, Hobby Time

Ritual for the Ordinary

Water from my kitchen faucet,
heated in a kettle bought online,
poured over loose leaves,

brings the scent to my nose—

there is no aesthetic
that can make this moment

more sacred than my stillness,
my attention,
my emotion,
and my will,
already do.

One of my favorite tea mugs with a portion of my my currently reading pile.

By Rommy Cortez-Driks

Song Choice: Simple Gifts arranged by Joseph M. Martin

Liner Notes for this Groove: This poem was created for the Friday Writings prompt at Poets and Storytellers United.

Waiting for Crocus

If I stand here long enough
I might see a crocus bloom.
But I’d likely freeze to death

before that happened.
Only my bones left
when the snow has melted

to see the purple fingers
of newborn crocus
reaching for the sky.

My ribcage could be
a serviceable cathedral

for mousely vows
said under springtime moons
and earthworm princes
to find the objects of their quests.

I’m afraid I’m too selfish to share
this space my heart is used to
taking up with just any random
invertebrate or rodent.

So I’ll pull my hat down lower
to cover up the howling of the wind,

go inside where my tea waits for me,
and come back to this place
when the crocus is ready for me.

Photo by Johannes Plenio on Unsplash

By Rommy Cortez-Driks

Song Choice: The Waiting by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers

Liner Notes for This Groove: This poem is linked to Poets and Storyteller United's Friday Writings, Feast or Famine. 

Find A Good Home For My Teas

Find a good home for my teas.

Make sure they will be gladly drunk
by people who will think of me
fondly, warming their hands
around a full mug.

I’ve had love, so much love,
pouring freely through
the dark corners of the labyrinths,

and wearing smooth
the odd-shaped cracks
that made up the mad tea party
I called my life.

I’d like to think some of that
love will come through
between the sips of tea

(maybe a few moments of laughter too)

long past the time
the warmth from it fades.

Photo by Loverna Journey on Unsplash

Song Choice: Earth Song by Harry Bellafonte. I've told the children this is one of the songs I absolutely want played at any sort of funeral they hold for me. 

This poem was created for the prompt given at Poets and Storytellers United, Weekly Scribblings #37: Last Messages.

By Rommy Cortez-Driks

Liminal Tea

I did not have a bowl of tea under the cherry blossoms on my birthday month in the way I had hoped. This spring’s strangeness outlasted both my birthday and those blooms, going past the scent of summer honeysuckle, and likely to linger after the veins of the last red leaf of autumn are crusted with frost. 

But the peace I find in my practice is also long lasting. Though the fall threatens more strange fruit and bitter harvests, though winter is a specter I can’t yet imagine, my battered mind finds a moment of respite in a space apart, created where the scent of matcha rises when water first meets it, and cradled in the sound of the whisk dancing in the bowl. And even if I cannot pass a bowl of tea to another’s appreciative hand, that rest found between the liminal spaces of foam and pouring water can travel freely for miles, any time to anyone who sets aside a corner of their heart for tea. 

I’ve learned to adapt,
mixing matcha for one. But
I can still share tea
steeped in my heart, an ocean
away, yet linked by spirit.

This was taken on the New Year's tea celebration my tea school holds every year.

It feels like a lifetime ago.

Song Choice: While My Guitar Gently Weeps performed by Prince, Tom Petty, Steve Winwood, Jeff Lynne and Others

Liner Notes for This Groove: This piece was created for the prompt given at Poets and Storytellers United's Weekly Scribblings #35, The Joy of Rest. It was also inspired by a request from my tea teacher. This September Urasenke North America is holding a chado relay, where they invite members from the different tea schools in North America to share images and words about their practice during these socially distanced times. I am a member of Urasenke Philadelphia and it will be our turn to share from the 7th to the 9th. 

By Rommy Cortez-Driks

Not So Small Hero

Koji looked at the assorted items he’d gathered and hoped it was enough. He’d never attempted magic before. Pushing down the feeling of panic that was threatening to burble out of his stomach and into his throat, he shouted the words to finish the rite.

Koji blinked and looked around him. Where was the powerful kami the ritual should have summoned? He hung his head, about to limp away, until he heard a tiny cough followed by a slurping noise. He looked down. Sitting in front of him was a tiny yokai with a bird’s beak and three fish tails drinking a bowl of tea. It gazed up at him with its large eyes. He could not decide if it was more adorable or grotesque. Either way, he knew he should still be polite.

“Hello,” he said.

“Hello,” she trilled. “Would you care for some tea?”

“No, thank you. I’m sorry to have bothered you. I was hoping to summon someone, er, bigger.”

She blinked at him again. “Why?”

 Koji flushed and looked away. “I had hoped they could train me. To be a strong warrior, like my brother was.”

“I wouldn’t be much help there. Are you sure that’s what you wanted?”

“Yes! He saved so many, like a hero in a story. I want to be one too, even though—”

“Oh, I see now. I can help you.”

“You can teach me to fight?” Koji’s eyes widened.

“No,” she said. “I’ll help you save lives.”

“How?”

“I’ll give you knowledge.”

“How will that help?”

“Have you heard people wishing they could go back to such and such time to do something that would have made a situation better? The moment to act is now. I’ll tell you what actions to take. But they will be simple, not the stuff of stories. You’ll get no praise or reward from anyplace other than your heart. Will that do?”

Koji thought of his brother and nodded. She told him of a coming plague and how to stay safe. When she finished, she gave him her tea bowl, which grew to fit his hands.

“Share the knowledge as you would share tea,” she said before disappearing.

"Thank you," he replied.

Liner Notes for This Groove: This short story was created for Poetry and Storytellers United's Weekly Scribblings #13: All the Small Things. It was inspired by an Atlas Obscura article about a healing spirit known as Amabie. You can also find out more about Amabie at Yokai.com After reading about her, I couldn't help by try my hand at drawing her too.

Song Choice: The Next Right Thing from Frozen II

By Rommy Cortez-Driks

Evolution of a Chajin: Blogging Around with Rommy Week 44

Water touches tea

releasing its sweet fragrance.

Today I receive

instead of serve. I find joy

in others’ first tastes of art.

This poem is linked to Poets United's Pantry of Poetry and Prose

Liner Notes For This Groove: I remember when I first started tea lessons. There were so many terms to learn, so many small details of movement and positioning to keep straight. I may have responded in Spanish a few times when I was supposed to answer in Japanese. I may have mangled my Japanese so I told my guests to finish cleaning up for me. But the older more experienced students were there to give me tips on how to remember things, tricks for polishing my techniques, and just be generally helpful.

So recently I had a lesson where I was the most senior student. I did advance clean up to make the lessons flow more smoothly, just the way I remember some of the older students did for me. I lent out some of my tea things so the newer students could practice with them.

Now I’ve been studying long enough to know I’ve made decent progress in my personal practice. But being able to help really made me feel like I was part of the tea school in a way I hadn’t experienced before. I was part of the process of helping others learn, and that felt really cool. Sen Rikyu (the founder of the Urasenke Tea School) wrote many famous poems regarding the art of tea. In his 98^th poem he wrote, “Mastery in chanoyu is a matter of empathy, versatility, and experience. When these three are present and in balance, the person is capable of true understanding.”  I make no claims to mastery but I’m happy in knowing I’ve made enough advances in all three to feel a new sense of place in a larger tradition.

Yummy tea treats. One of the new students was helpful
in finding the best angle to take the picture.

So dear Groovers, what traditions are close to your heart? Talk to me about them in the comments section and do drop a link to your cyberhome if you want to take the conversation to a deeper place.

Song Choice: Be True to Your School by The Beach Boys

By Rommy Cortez-Driks

Matcha, Hot: Blogging Around with Rommy Week 27

“When the going gets tough, the tough go to tea.” 
― Js Devivre, The Tea Traveller's Constant Companion: Oregon


Art brewed in the blood
won't lose sharpness or flavor
at temperature's whim.

Liner Notes For this Groove: I take the majority of my tea lessons in one of the prettiest places I know, Shofuso (the Japanese house and gardens in Philadelphia's Fairmount Park). But this last weekend wasn't the best time to practice there. More than half of the USA was going through a scorcher of a heat wave. I wasn't sure if lessons were going to be cancelled outright, so I emailed my teachers to ask if the small utility room we sometimes used in the winter might be a better choice. They thought that was a good idea, so lessons were on.

Even with the venue change, I didn't expect too many people to make it. It was still a nasty day and the room's air conditioner could best be described as well-meaning. But it was a pretty full shed house, with a bunch of newer students (I was actually the most experienced one who showed). Even in a stuffy room, humid enough to make the tea clump and the tools stick to your hands a bit, we all enjoyed our lessons.

So dear Groovers, how was your weekend? Hopefully it was less melty than mine! Let's talk about it in the comments section. As always, feel free to drop a link to your cyber home if you'd like to continue the discussion there.

By Rommy Cortez-Driks

Song Choice: Just Can't Get Enough by Depeche Mode

Air and Fire's Girl: Blogging Around with Rommy Week 22

Air’s girl dances fast,

fire waltzing to a song

she knows in her heart.

Flame and wind will always be

hers, even when she stands still.

Song Choice: Slow Hand by the Pointer Sisters

This post is linked with Imaginary Gardens with Real Toads' Tuesday Platform.

Liner Notes for this Groove: If I may be permitted to get a little woo…I am one of the airiest earth signs known to humankind. According to western astrology, although my sun was chilling in Taurus on my birthday, a butt load of my planets were hanging around in signs that are associated with the element of air (and I have a couple of things dancing around in fire too). Someone who is an expert on such matters told me that when they first met me, they thought I was a Gemini—until they heard me wax poetic over tea (then I outted myself with my Taurean tendencies).

Whether you place any stock in such matters or not, this much is clear—I have a tendency to want to do things fast. That’s not always such a terrible thing (I’m going to be delighted about that time I got the winning goal in sportsball forever), but in tea ceremony…yeah, it’s not really encouraged, no matter how well you know the moves.

I mean, you could. It just probably won't be right.

Funnily enough I found the answer back in air…in my breath that is. On my teacher’s suggestion I started pacing my movements to flow in synchrony with my breath, so each movement took on a rhythm that was fully mine. Not only that, it was a way for my personal style (LOL, my inner fire for my love of tea) to come through and be seen so much more clearly by guests.

In The Book of Tea Kakuzo Okakura wrote “Teaism is a cult founded on the adoration of the beautiful among the sordid facts of everyday existence…It is essentially a worship of the Imperfect, as it is a tender attempt to accomplish something possible in this impossible thing we know as life.” I am rather imperfect at being an earth sign, but in my practice of tea I can honor my inner air with my breath and my inner fire with my passion for the art form. My earthy self can take plenty of joy at eating the tea sweets, while my watery side delights in simply drinking the tea.

So dear Groovers, what to you is worth slowing down for? Or what's new with you this week? Let's talk about it, and as always, if you'd like to continue the conversation on your cyberhome, include the web address in the comments. 

By Rommy Cortez-Driks

One Seed, Ten Thousand Seeds: Blogging Around with Rommy Week 18

The shade of a blessed tree watches over the seedlings that came from one righteous act. One of six thousand good deeds seems so small against the six million lost in lightning and storms, in the showers that choked. But to see the seedlings growing strong and true to their roots, in this place where my grafted limbs have been trained to do justice to the sublime green—this sends a fresh seed into my heart for me to treasure when I am weary in the fight for the soil I’ve been planted in.

A modest hero

defined by quiet resolve

and strange defiance

inspires my jaded heart

to go and resist again.

Song Choice: The Change by Garth Brooks

Liner Notes for This Groove: I was so very honored to be part of a special friendship tea ritual Urasenke Philadelphia held in honor of the son of Chiune Sugihara (a Japanese diplomat who saved 6,000+ Jews during WWII) and the son of one of the people he saved, Rabbi Shimon Goldman. I’ve often had reason to agree with the quote “Where there is tea, there is hope” by Arthur Wing Pinero. But I felt especially hopeful serving tea that afternoon.

By Rommy Cortez-Driks

This was the set up we used for the ceremony. I know it isn't very visible but the script on the tea container translates to "One Seed, Ten Thousand Seeds." Tea tools are chosen very carefully to suit the occasion. I think that this was the perfect tea container for that day.

By Rommy Cortez-Driks

This poem is linked to Imaginary Gardens with Real Toads' Tuesday Platform.

How's your week been dear Groovers? Anything making you feel a little hopeful? Catch me up with your world in the comments section. And feel free to work in a link in your comments if you want to take the discussion onto your cyberhome.

Peace in a Bowl

When you serve tea to your guests, you should simply serve tea from your heart, and think about nothing more.

-Poem 93 of Sen Rikyu

I’ve spent years learning

how to set aside my worries at the teahouse door,

and lose myself

in the sound of pouring water

and the scent of matcha rising from the bowl.

Some days that isn’t easy.

The world likes to devour souls by bits

and I can’t drink enough tea

to wash the bitter taste from my mouth.

It is then I remember

tea bowls were meant for sharing.

The art of tea cannot be measured

by the strokes of my whisk

or the thickness in the folds of my cloth.

But it can be fairly gauged

by the smile on my guest’s face.

The peace that eluded me

roots in them, multiplies,

and finally alights in me.

When we leave the teahouse

we both carry more than enough

peace to share, where before there was turmoil.

Song Choice: I’d Like to Teach the World to Sing by the Seekers. 

This poem is linked up to Poets United, Midweek Motif and dVerse, OLN 234.

Notes from the Real World (if you’re just here for the poetry, feel free to skip this part, though I expect MissWicked ought to read it, since she’s the one who challenged me to do it): This poem was inspired by one of three scrolls that were shared by my tea school last year. They were meant to inspire peace in the hearts of people who saw them. My fellow students and I were tasked with serving tea while visitors came to admire the scroll. I admit my mood was cynical before I walked in the door (because hey, 2017 gave people a lot to be cynical about), but as the day progressed, I found myself becoming more peaceful with each bowl of tea I made, and living up to the words on the scroll—providing a small seed of peace for everyone who walked through Shofuso’s doors, and seeing folks leave carrying a bit of that peaceful spirit that (hopefully) they could share with others.

Now of course, 2017 doesn’t hold a monopoly on my moods of cynicism and doubt. Although I’m just coming out of the experience of finishing and publishing a short story collection, a giant cloud with the words “What’s next?” seems to have followed me around from the moment I clicked the button to officially release the book out into the world. The good news is I have lots of ideas. The bad news is that they all are spinning around me like a cyclone of bright shiny things I can reach towards but can’t quite grab. I’m overwhelmed.

The idea of achieving world peace is exponentially more overwhelming, but in that afternoon at Shofuso, I know that I along with my fellow tea students created a haven where peace could quietly slip into someone’s heart, and that peace could spread to people they interacted with later. If such a simple act can do that, maybe it’s not too far-fetched of an idea to take a moment or two to give myself the gift of tea, savor it, and see what comes from that. It’s worth a shot.

By Rommy Cortez-Driks

Momentary

Matcha's perfume wafts
from cradled porcelain bowl
tasting of springtime.
My spirit needs this moment
to remember my purpose.

A sketch of one of my newest tea bowls

Song Choice: A Little Too Much by Shawn Mendes

This poem was created from a prompt given by me over at Imaginary Gardens With Real Toads: Creature Comforts. Hop on to the pond to see what the rest of the toads have to say on the topic of comforts. It is also linked to Poets United Poetry Pantry 380.

By Rommy Cortez-Driks

Stolen

Giichi opened the dogu box honoring his brother on the family shrine. Would blasphemy make matcha taste even sweeter? Yuuki would not have shied away from either thievery or blasphemy if it stood between him and a perfect bowl of tea.  His heart thumped as he pulled out a tea scoop. Yuuki had sacrificed himself because Giichi’s failed attempt at stealing dogu refined enough to use with it. The rightful owner caught him in the act, demanding Yuuki’s servitude in exchange for Giichi’s life.

No one was here to thwart his thieving this time. Making a bowl of tea with this particular scoop would be a better way to honor Yuuki than letting it remain unused.

Giichi had been snooping around his brother’s room the first time he held this scoop. As he pulled it out he heard, “Can I help you with something, ototo?” from behind him. Yuuki stood where a flower arrangement had been a moment before. Giichi hadn’t realized that he could change himself into smaller, non-animal objects yet. At 180, Yuuki was young for a kitsune to be able to do that.

“Did you really steal this from a warlord?” Giichi said.

“No, I stole it from a merchant. One of my bowls was from a warlord, but it was a gift,” Yuuki came over to Giichi and took the box. “If you ask nicely I will show all my dogu to you.”

“Please?”

Yuuki arranged the box’s contents in front of Giichi, explaining each’s purpose. Giichi wasn’t very impressed with the tea scoops.

“They’re just bits of curved bamboo,” Giichi said.

“To eyes that rush maybe. That’s why it’s best to ask. You can take the time to appreciate them. Each has a special name, sometimes associated with something seasonal. This one is called Ginpu,” Yuuki said, lifting one.

Giichi studied the scoops. “I like the first one,” he said, picking it up. “What’s its name?”

“Its previous owner didn’t tell me. I suppose I’ll have to think of one.”

“Can I name it?”

“Yes, but put it down carefully. Each tool should be handled like you are saying farewell to a dear friend whom you are unsure of meeting again.”

The next day Yuuki performed a ceremony for Giichi’s amusement, claiming he needed to practice a special form reserved only for royalty. Though he knew nothing of tea etiquette then, Giichi played the part of the noble. He had fidgeted, wolfed down every sweet Yuuki had talked a cousin into preparing, and demanded Yuuki name the scoop “Prince Giichi” even as his affronted cousin rolled his eyes at the inappropriateness of the name.  Still, Yuuki kept the name until the day he was stolen.

Giichi’s mind returned to the present as he made himself a bowl of tea. He handled each tool just as his brother had taught him, and drank. It was exquisite.  He picked up the scoop again.

“When I find you, oniisan, call it whatever you like. But while it’s mine, its name will be Matsuyuuki. Each bowl I prepare with it honors you.” 

Japanese words:

dogu: tools used in Japanese tea ceremony

ototo: little brother

Ginpu: "reading poems in the autumn breeze while moon gazing"

oniisan: big brother

Matsuyuuki: literally "snow covered pine", which is a fine name for a tea scoop, but it is also a play on Yuuki’s name (which means snow) and pine, which oddly enough has a similar double meaning in Japanese and English (both a tree, and to wait or long for something). 

Song Choice:  My Hero by The Foo Fighters

This is some of my dogu.

This short story was created as part of October's Heart Bits With Magaly: Love is Love is Love and Words. Follow the link to see other fun offerings. Long time readers might remember Yuuki from several short stories I've written before. If you are new to the blog and curious as to what actually happened to Giichi's brother, you can read about it here.

By Rommy Cortez-Driks

Callus

I remember its birthday.

OK, not the day it was born,

but the year.

It was the Why Are You Fat,

Why Are You Strange,

Why Aren’t You Pretty,

You Can’t Sit With Us Year.

It got bigger every year,

until I could paint a face on it

with a big, red rubber nose

and a wide grin.

It was magic, you see.

It had power to bend laughter.

It grew even bigger after that,

and thicker, like redwood rings,

but,

if you know the right words,

maybe arrive in an enchanted whirlwind,

or conjure up the perfect enlightening glow,

you might find a small knot in the bark.

I might be so startled you found it

that I'd invite you in,

where you'll sit down,

and have a cup of tea with me,

maybe.

Song Choice: Little Tiny by Brandi Ediss

This poem was created from a prompt given over at Imaginary Gardens With Real Toads Little Tiny, write a poem inspired by the song Little Tiny. 

By Rommy Cortez-Driks

Nonsense Cloud

Myriads of fantasies

always billow about in my brain,

as easily contained as dandelion fluff.

They promenade in by the score

vying for attention day and night,

brightly feathered and chirping,

heedless of my need

to deal with terra firma.

But if you were to ask,

not just about my imaginings,

but of desires and aspirations –

I want

my children to know

happiness from knowing oneself,

my husband to feel

at ease in the comfort of our love,

my friends to have

peace of heart, mind and body,

a good cup of tea,

a story to tell,

and to find people

who’d like to hear that story.

Song Choice: Give Me the Simple Life by Ella Fitzgerald 

This poem was created from the prompt given over at A Dash of Sunny, Prompt Nights: Dreams

By Rommy Cortez-Driks

Simple Gentility

To discerning hearts,

meek field strewn peasants ascend

to tea house nobles.

 My flower arrangement for tea ceremony. 

Process note: The art of arranging flowers for tea is called chabana, and it is customary to use simple seasonal flowers, even weeds and grass so long as they aren't fragrant, in the arrangement. 

Song Choice: Simple Gifts by Yo Yo Ma and Alison Krauss

This poem is in response to the prompt given at Imaginary Gardens for Real Toads: Weeds in the Garden.

By Rommy Cortez-Driks

Beauty and Tea

The chajin seeks an atypical sense of perfection, not in symmetry, but in the beauty of nature. Too ruthless a concept of loveliness will keep you from appreciating the charm of an odd shaped bowl, mismatched tea tools and a well-loved vase. There is nothing we can point to as the perfect tree or the perfect flower, but yet we are moved by their beauty even with the lack of a hard measure of it. This concept of beauty applies outside the tearoom as well. To love someone does not require perfection, in lover or beloved, but appreciation of the oddities, quirks and glitches, yet still finding them lovely.

In uneven bowls,

and in my beloved’s smile,

I find perfection

Song Choice: You Are the Beauty by Gungor

I purchased this beautiful tea bowl from Art to Hold. It has it's own bit of history

Process note: Chajin literally means "tea person", one who studies the art of tea

This haibun is inspired by the prompt given over at A Dash of Sunny. This week's topic for Prompt Night is perfection

By Rommy Cortez-Driks

In the Genes

I think I remember writing some time ago about my mom and our relationship

For those not familiar with My Little Pony:

My dad's comment after seeing Brave was, "They even got the hair right!"

I did mention I got to appreciate her more once I moved out of the house. I love her. She loves me. And the differences are much easier to deal with in half day visits and phone calls. Her idea of the great outdoors is a mall with trees in the food court? Fine by me. I'll head to the local nature center later.

So during one of our visits I start talking to her about Japanese tea ceremony. It really can be quite complex, all the forms to memorize, the Japanese language skills. And then there are the related arts of kimono wearing, calligraphy, incense, tool making. She starts to look a bit glazed when I go on about all this and I mention she should come to one of the ceremonies they have at Shofuso, the Japanese house in Philadelphia. I'd try to arrange taking on a role as an assistant for that day, fully decked out in a formal kimono. After she gets done laughing at the idea of seeing me dressed in a kimono, she says she might come out to one, but she isn't sure. Is green tea the only option? Can she add sugar to hers.

I think I managed not to outwardly cringe. Green tea served at a formal Japanese tea ceremony is whisked up directly from powdered tea leaves. There are lots of beautiful nuances of flavor between different brands, growing locations, harvest times; nuances you'd miss with adding anything else. Sugar is NEVER added and neither is milk. I told her maybe I'd make a batch for her informally at home just for her to try rather than take the time to drive into Philly.

So later that day, she's out with me while I'm running some errands and we get to the supermarket. My mom makes a beeline for the tea section. Perplexed, I follow her. She paces up and down our local Wegman's pretty impressive tea section until she finds what she wants - an inexpensive brand of Earl Grey tea. I give a her weird look as she proceeds to empty the shelf of it, looking a bit like Daffy Duck in a cave filled with gold.

"Uh, mom. That's not exactly hard to find tea. You can get it at any supermarket."

"It's not just any Earl Grey tea. It's MY brand of Earl Grey tea. And it tastes better than any of the weird loose stuff you have. I'm always running out of it."

She goes on to wax lovingly about the variations in Earl Grey and how this particular brand has just the right sort of blend none other can match. She's actually pretty knowledgeable about flavor profiles, and she definitely knows what she likes. My mom marches to the check out counter like she's Indiana Jones carrying a sacred relic back to a museum. And I realize, though we are pretty different, we both take our tea time seriously. Very, very seriously.

By Rommy Cortez-Driks

Song Choice: Let's Call the Whole Thing Off preformed by Harry Connick Jr.

Picture, Earl Grey Dragon, used with 

kind permission of the artist, Brian Kesinger. 

See more of his super cute, tea themed art at his etsy shop. 

This post is part of the Mad Tea Party 2015 blog hop hosted by  A Fanciful Twist. Follow the link to see more fun tea themed blog posts

Update From the Real World

I think this might be my first blog post about real world happenings in a while. I've been really focused on living up to the promise I made to myself to get enough short stories written to have a real *gulp* book ready for publication. I have two stories that need a second run through, a Yuuki story that is ready for another pair of eyes besides mine, a Rina story started and notes/ outlines on a couple more stories, including a Cordelia one. I originally thought I'd have seven in this collection, but that might be too little. I'll have to see what all of them look like once they've been edited at least once before I decide.

In between writing, I've been working on tea and belly dance. I find I can write a bit better if I keep active in between writing sessions. I think I'm finally getting this new tea form, which means they'll be throwing another one at me soon. Also I had the chance to play with my veil fans again on Monday night lesson. I forgot how much I loved working with those props. It makes me want to dust off the routine I choreographed for them awhile back.

I'll be back with a new poem for the blog soon. In the meantime, let me know if you'd like to see more real world updates from me from time to time.

By Rommy Cortez-Driks

Tea sweets from a recent lesson. The classmate who made them is quite talented!

Song Choice: Here I Am by Sertab (this is the song I choreographed the veil fan routine to)