Classic Poem

Growing old, my skill markedly stagnates.
I ought to stop now painting svelte bamboo.
Brush by brush, I know, I make ugly things.
What to do, still trying to " copy the frown " ?

By the bamboo window I sleep listening to rain.
Its clean sound suggests different things.
Rustling, it's crabs crawling on the sand.
Soughing, it's silkworms climbing a leaf.

All over the paper smoky clouds darken,
a blue dragon coiled around the stones.
Slithering up from my window base,
it will, I fear, drink up my pool of ink.