Fascination with tea

The Seven Cups of Tea


"The first cup moistens my lips and throat,
the second cup breaks my loneliness,
the third cup searches my barren entrail but to find therein some five thousand volumes of odd ideographs.

The fourth cup raises a slight perspiration, - all the wrong of life passes away through my pores.

At the fifth cup I am purified;
the sixth cup calls me to the realms of immortals.

The seventh cup - ah, but I could take no more!

I only feel the breath of cool wind that rises in my sleeves.
Where is Horaisan? Let me ride on this sweet breeze and waft away thither."

-taken from a quote by Lotung, a Tang poet (The Book of Tea)