Let a hundred flowers bloom.
- Mao
Party time was Thursday afternoon
but I could usually run a postgrad class.
That day I played "The Solitary Reaper",
and while they followed the text, watched
the Faculty raking leaves and smelt
the fragrance from their fires down below.
It made me smile to see professors and the rest
deft with skills learned in the dynasty of Mao.
I turned up Wordsworth, leaned out, urged them on.
Some faces shone, most did not, but all talk stopped.