Asian Heart
My heart yearns to travel --
to meet new friends and
experience their ways of life
that expand my view.
Part of my heart is
a permanent resident of Asia.
If I bought a ticket
for the Orient Express,
I’d be disappointed to reach
the end of the line in Istanbul.
My heart wants to continue
through India and Nepal,
and then turn south.
I’d get off in Thailand
to visit a mediation temple,
offer a tribute of silence
on the hallowed ground of Tuol Sleng,
and learn to cook
in a Vietnamese kitchen.
Somehow my train
would whisk me over or under the sea
to behold the beauty
of Filipino rice fields,
before going north again
to contemplate the juxtaposition of past and future
along the Huangpu River
and to listen to the sounds
on a walk through South Korean streets.
My Orient Express
would include a Channel Tunnel
from South Korea to Japan,
ending my Asian tour
among the smell of sakura blossoms.
I’d visit these people and places
and come away changed
for falling in love with the world
and celebrating our differences.
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