The Naming of Teas

In the shade of the broad-leafed avocado
the aged men spend their time
in the naming of teas.

Yellow maté of their own mountains.
From the lowlands sweet rice tea,
thick with the taste of heavy air.

Teas from the foreign shop on the square:
Souchong, Gen Mai Cha, Earl Grey
in blue tins, Darjeeling in green.

In the naming of such teas the tongue
caresses unfamiliar lands, to smell
them is to know their earth and sky.

Finally there is the tea you smoke.
Pedro Adirez rolls it carefully
between his knobby brown fingers

and it is passed from hand to hand.
Across the square the afternoon sun
turns very white upon the sand.

While in the shade of the avocado trees
the aged men spend their time
in the naming of summers:

the summer of the great heat,
of the horse plague, the summer
they all rode mules to the Capitol.

First appeared in Berkeley Poets Cooperative