Scene: Kyushu. A small garden pavilion.       Time: Early evening, late May, the year 901.       Speakers: Two Heian poets, Sugawara Michizane (845-903) and       Lady Ise (?877-?940) M: I: M: I: M: I: M: I: M: I: M: I: M: I: M: I: M: I: M: I: M: I: Affinities, Lady Ise, correspondences: Blue leaps to blue. This iris is a flame. Consider their origins, Michizane: Fire from fuel, flowers from seed. Consider that the same turf Feeds flame and bloom. Eiko's kiss was petaled, Keiko's touch burned. So you told me. My soup was hot, my soup grew cold: Same soup. You ate up the beans but left the radishes Untouched. And if tomorrow I eat the radishes But leave the beans…? Tomorrow there may be none. Everything longs for rain. Rain falls, ceases, falls. Longing endures. I know where rain furrows rice-powder And no peonies bloom. There, one sows comfort And cultivates distress. My friend, not every soil Will bear all crops. When frogs jump in a pond, All make the same splash. Listen: each frog croaks Its own note. The plucked string sounds many notes But remains the same. How different the same note sounds In June or December. Yet June brings round December, December June. Still, you sweat and crave snow, Shiver and dream of roses. Metaphors, Lady Ise, And all for the same desire. Why then, Michizane, do you not Lay down your brush? A thousand jackdaws, a thousand poets-- What is one more or less? Tea every evening, thousands of cups, Yet how fragrant. Are you not thirsty? Ann Lauinger lives in Ossining, NY and teaches Renaissance and medieval literature at Sarah Lawrence College. Her poems have appeared in Confrontation, Natural Bridge, Parnassus, Rattapallax and Tampa Review.