Consider kintsugi, the mild-mannered, soft-voiced Asian man begins the last workshop in the Zen series. His skin is brown and smooth as a nut released whole from its shell. Antonia wishes she could take him home, a lucky charm to keep her safe from all the dragons.
A Japanese repair technique, he explains. They have gone around the circle, each person giving her or his name. They are mostly females, Antonia notes, their teacher appending teacher to each one’s name. Antonia Teacher is next to last before their teacher, who introduces himself as No Teacher. The class nods reverently.
A joke, No Teacher says, giggling like a child being tickled.
He holds aloft a serving platter as if he is waiting for them to bid on it. Then, shockingly he knocks the plate against a nearby rock in the pebble garden they learned to rake into patterns last Saturday. The group gasps, but the small man throws back his head and laughs, then kneels to collect the broken pieces. A few of the attendees come forward to help, but No Teacher bows to each one.
Is unnecessary, he says in the same playful voice.
In reassembling the platter, No Teacher will not be using transparent glue and attempting to hide the broken places. He gestures toward a lineup of five bowls on a low table, then tilts each one in turn to display its contents: one filled with a thick amber lacquer, another with gold powder, a third with a clear liquid that smells like turpentine, one with plain water. The largest vessel is empty, and in it he mixes the lacquer and gold powder, adding several drips of water. He pulls up a footstool and sets to work, reuniting piece with piece, dabbing his brush into the gleaming paste, until the platter is mended, the gold intersecting grid showing where it has been broken. No Teacher clamps the platter firmly between his hands, waiting for the glue to set. Is time to meditate, he says, closing his eyes.
Antonia closes her own eyes. She sees herself falling out of the sky like that boy in the poem she taught maybe a hundred times in her teaching life. All the things she is breaking in her plunge are being reassembled, a painter’s brush correcting her errors, the lines of repair showing up as lines in poems and stories she has loved, evidence of the damage done.
She should not be having these thoughts. She should be meditating.
Is whole, No Teacher remarks, waking her from her reverie, beaming his transfixing smile, his face a scratchpad of wrinkles. He holds up the repaired platter. For a moment, Antonia fears he will smash it into pieces again.
The platter goes around their circle, each one tracing the ridged gold lines, the damage made visible, the platter repaired. It tells a story. That it has been broken.
Is beautiful, No Teacher concludes.