Poets came from every part of the kingdom for the gathering at the Lotus Pavilion. Some traveled alone. Some brought maids and concubines. A princess from the Caucasus arrived with six warrior body guards.
It was to be a memorable gathering, timed to co-incide with the viewing of the plum blossoms. Grandmother Wu could not last another year and she had long dreamed of such a gathering of poets. There would be much feasting. Many poems would be written and perhaps many remembered.
Peasant women thronged the compound gates laden down with provisions. Bolts of gorgeous silks had been shaken out and eyed carefully by the seamstresses. Their job was to make sure that every member of the family was as beautifully dressed as any of the gathering.
It was well known that the maid Chalcedony was the best poet in the compound. Only a month earlier she had brought Grandmother Wu to tears with her poem on the Winter Moon. Now the big question in the compound was whether Chalcedony would enter a poem at the gathering. The concubines begged her not to. It would be shaming to our master, they said. It is his dream to win the great prize, to bring honor to Grandmother Wu. If you were to win they would send you away. You will be penniless and alone.
``I am penniless and alone to-day,'' said Chalcedony.
``A safe place to sleep is preferable to honor,'' a maid named Leaf Cutter said.
Chalcedony was thin and quiet. Some thought her beautiful. Her joy was to sit, brush in hand, and bring words to life with elegant brush strokes. Words that could be contemplated with equal pleasure by the eye as the ear.
Chalcedony thought long before she came up with a solution. She decided to enter the the poetry contest.
Her first poem was on drinking white tea from a black cup. The subtlety of the pleasure aroused by the faint aroma emanating from the warm, fragrant darkness of the cup. Smiles appeared everywhere. Small and unassuming yet perfect.
Her second poem was different. It spoke of the harshness of a life of duty and honor and servitude. It was a hard poem, filling the mind with disquiet. The people shifted in their seats and turned their eyes away from each other.
Chalcedony did not win the prize. Neither did the master, but there was much celebrating among the plum blossoms.
``We must do this again - a great success,'' said Grandmother Wu.