Thursday, July 10, 2014

Carpe Diem Haiku Shiki


After the earthquake

You were sleeping for so long

That my hair turned grey

 

Fifteen thousand stones

Each one thrown in pain

But spring is coming


 

Waiting in vain

Spring turned to summer

And still it’s winter

 


3 comments:

  1. What an extraordinary response on this GW-post about Shiki ... very strong emotions as Shiki must have had when he became ill.

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  2. 15,000 stones thrown in pain - related to the earthquake? I'm curious as to the history and story behind this gorgeous series of haiku. I really feel the pain here -- it's truly breathtaking. Waiting ... waiting ... growing older ... waiting. Really wonderful poetry here.

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    Replies
    1. The 15,000 is an allusion to the calligraphy of Shiki, which is seen on the stone monument at Matsuyama (Kristjaan used a picture of thes stone). As I treat chronic pain patients I have a vast, though second hand knowledge about pain. I like the association you had: an earthquake. Ai Weiwei commemorated the more than 5,000 schoolkids, who died in an earthquake because of the badly build schools, in one of his major works and on the net (he was giving their namens on twitter).

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