Checkpoint

Even without a border-guard to check my passport I knew I had entered a different country
Everything was changed because nothing had changed except that the light was altering the sky by essential fractions
A certain foreknowing accompanied by an equal, if not greater, unknowing and some intangibility urging itself forward towards….
What you don’t know defines what you know – and perhaps that is the first lesson you need to learn, as if in saying What thou lovest well remains – the rest is dross. Pound had struck some vital artery of the world and set it ringing like a gong
After which you can never imagine the world being anything else but what it is – an epiphany and puzzlement, a necessity not to be replaced by anything else, the Buddha’s playground of doubt and test it for yourself
The tea houses are empty and the borders unguarded

A passport isn’t worth the paper it’s written on

The only valid visa is your passion

Martin Burke is a poet & playwright, born in Ireland, now living in Belgium. He has had books published in the USA, UK, Ireland, & Belgium
and is founder of the bilingual theatre company Theater Zonder Thuis (The Homeless Theatre Company).His blog is here.