Kenneth Wong
The Ballad of the Umbrellas
Long ago
The Poet Li Po
Used an umbrella
To scoop the moon’s reflection
Out of Pearl River.
Long before that
Guan Yu used an umbrella
To hold back the tanks from Cao Cao’s army
Rolling into Tiananmen Square;
To fend off the terracotta warriors in riot gear
Advancing under the cover of a gas cloud
Manufactured in a Special Economic Zone.
Years later
A tofu seller from Mong Kok
Used his umbrella to strike down
The mosquitoes and the tigers,
And a banker
Trapped in a 23-story birdcage in Causeway Bay
Hit himself in the head with his to wake up
From the Dream of the Red Chamber.
Today
Scrawny geeks and bookish nerds
Gather in a peach garden and take an oath
To raise their umbrellas higher than the Great Wall,
To block out the breath of the dragon,
The wrath of the emperor,
And the shadows of the crows
That flew in from Beijing.
Gather under a million umbrellas
Where all men are created equal;
Where Joshua Wong, Min Ko Naing,
Liu Xiaobo, and Aung San Suu Kyi
Speak the same provincial dialect;
Where the yellow ribbons of Hong Kong,
The red shirts of Thailand,
And the saffron robes of Burma
Beckon a new dawn;
Where bowls of noodles cooked in old men’s sweat
And sweet milk tea flavored with a sidewalk vendor’s hope
Fuel a new day.
Don’t forget your umbrella!
It is
The Warrior God’s halberd,
The Monkey God’s staff,
Ai Wei Wei’s paintbrush,
Bruce Lee’s fist of fury,
The vermilion sword in Jin Yong’s wuxia,
The five-petal orchid blossom
That smells like freedom,
And grandma’s chopsticks —
Always reaching for the best piece of dim sum
At the far end of the table.
(for the people of Hong Kong)
Kenneth Wong
October 19, 2014
San Francisco, California