Beyond the window
the countryside moves past
at seventy
maybe eighty miles an hour
just across from me
my teacher
Master Hua
the only fearless man
I've ever known
You have to jump
he says to me
I'll die I say
no you won't
just trust me
and somehow I do
so out the window
and the next thing I know
I'm sitting by the tracks
watching the train
rush off into the distance
at my back
the forest trees are trembling
and I feel
such a deep sense of relief
knowing at last
my real life has begun