INSTINCTS #4: ‘At the Asian Art Center’ by Vonnie Winslow Crist

Hello and Happy Valentine’s Day!

February’s feature for INSTINCTS is a poem from the prolific Vonnie Winslow Crist! We’re proud to have her as a contributor of Insignia: Asian Science Fiction, and in our upcoming Japanese Fantasy Drabbles anthology as well.

This piece is titled, ‘At the Asian Art Center’ and is inspired by the work of artist Hee-Young Kim.

At the Asian Art Center

by Vonnie Winslow Crist

Listen.
Hee-Young Kim has written
a poem
on four horizontal banners pressed
edge to edge like
river, grass, mountain, sky.

Look.
Strokes on these panels
translate odes
chanted by airy spirits
into the ear of Hee-Young.
And she, treasured interpreter, used
brush, paper, inkstone, and ink stick
to paint mementos of
the wind’s meeting
beneath the Coincident Moon
with shy bamboo—
beyond graceful
in her robe of silvered jade.

Wait.
In this quiet, glass-and-wood gallery,
if you tilt your head, just so,
you will hear
the lament of owl
as she hides midst pine boughs,
and touch
the essence of abandonment.

• First Published 2009, The Chesapeake Reader

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Vonnie Winslow Crist is author of The Enchanted Dagger, Owl Light, The Greener Forest, Murder on Marawa Prime, and other award-winning books. Her fantastical stories have been published in Canada, Spain, India, Australia, Japan, the UK and USA. Born in the Year of the Dragon, Vonnie believes the world is still filled with magic, mysteries, and miracles. For more information check her website: http://www.vonniewinslowcrist.com

To read a very long excerpt from her fantasy novel, The Enchanted Dagger: https://www.wattpad.com/226314378-the-enchanted-dagger-an-excerpt

Then, buy a copy for your bookshelf: https://www.amazon.com/Enchanted-Dagger-Chronicles-Lifthrasir/dp/1941559182/

For those who’d like to listen to or read a free fantasy story by Vonnie, here is the link to “Henkie’s Fiddle”: http://www.castofwonders.org/2016/03/episode-202-henkies-fiddle-by-vonnie-winslow-crist/

Website: http://vonniewinslowcrist.com/
blog: http://vonniewinslowcrist.wordpress.com
Facebook: http://facebook.com/WriterVonnieWinslowCrist
Twitter: @VonnieWCrist

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Do you have an Asian fantasy or science fiction poem you would like us to feature? Our INSTINCTS poetry series is open to submissions of original poems. Full details are on the submissions page.

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