BEING THE DRAGON ON THE FOURTH OF JULY
They see our feet below the drapes of cloth, the stripes of purple, green, yellow. They watch our careful steps. The red-tongued dragon dips and dances down the street. They see our human feet.
Outside the air grows warm. We follow in parade inside the glittering worm, this mask that hands have made. Under the dragon’s shade, dancing the dragon’s path, we breathe our human breath.
“O, the dragon,” they say, those people standing by, but we are far away, here in another sky; we’ve risen in the air above temporal things, aloft on dragon wings.
Inside we are a world untroubled by the rest. Over our heads we hold the dragon, manifest its benediction. Blessed– and blessing all–we rise seeing through dragon eyes.
Three years ago, I was IN a Chinese Dragon in a Fourth of July Parade. This poem, in Rhyme Royal, is about that experience.