Christopher in Beijing

Christopher is in Beijing

Practicing violin

For his time
In the lagoon

He will be submerged

Underwater

In a Chinese submarine

Where he will be expected

To play

Flawlessly

For a depressed whale

That is a favorite

Of a local leader

The violin music will be sent

Through the speakers

On top of the submarine

But to get maximum texture

Christopher must be inside

The submarine

And he must be in Beijing

And he must wonder

Why

There are no violinists

In all of China

Who could qualify

For a task such as this

And how they discovered

The whale’s love

Of lyrical violin

But Christopher doesn’t ask questions

Which the Chinese like about him

They don’t ask about his family

His wife, Jey-tah

His two children, Box and Fanfare

They don’t ask about America

Certainly no politics

Certainly nothing

With depth

Christopher rides in a car

To the small province

Where the whale water is

Not quite a lake

Not nearly an ocean

But big enough for a whale

Of a substantial size

To swim around in

And it’s called a lagoon

Even though it is

In no way

A lagoon

Beijing is not in the province

So we won’t be telling you

What happened

When Christopher tried

Playing for the whale

Because this is not called--

Christopher and the Whale

Although that would be

An interesting title

No, we’re going to tell you

About Christopher in Beijing

And how his third night there

He bought a shirt

He thought would look good on him

Only to discover

There was a hole

Under the left sleeve

And Christopher

Not knowing how to say--

There’s a hole in this shirt

That shouldn’t be here

Decides he should just keep it

And use it as a prop at parties

A funny story to tell

Christopher doesn’t dwell on the fact

That he doesn’t go to parties

Because Jey-tah hates leaving the kids

For even an hour at a time

And what are they going to do

When it’s time to send them to pre-school

Too much to consider

Especially while in Beijing

He spends most of his time

In his hotel

Which isn’t all that interesting

But it is what he does

And we suppose there’s a statement to be made

About Americans who travel abroad

To the most incredible places on earth

Only to trap themselves

In safe surroundings

But we won’t make that statement

Because we’re storytellers

Not moralists

We’ll just let you know

That on the last night in Beijing

After the incident

At the lagoon-that-is-not-a-lagoon

Christopher lay in his hotel room bed

Looking up at the ceiling

Past the ceiling

Drenched in non-lagoon water

His violin, cracked in two,

Resting beside him

And from the belly of his belly

He brought forth

A tremendous cry

That nearly split all of Beijing

In half