The first of a cycle of sonnets describing my trip to Beijing

Always already, the art of tea brew
As ceremony, celebration, art,
Practise, joy, culture, good deep and true,
From Japan articulated in part.

Tea is Chinese, old like hills with man names-
Tea Ceremony is modern, novel.
In tourist shops deployed in timely frames
To send porcelain sold on foreign travel.

By tailored ritual, lives are sped along
The practised Hu-Tong path, tourist rutted
With cups, saucers, filled with jasmine, oolong,
This novelty by citizens tut-tutted.

The mahoganny chairs change butts with time,
Selling mugs for tea bags crusted with twee rime.