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Beautiful People

RIP one of my favorite poets

ShuntaroTanikawa … one of greatest poets from Japan passed away. He was 92. His Japanese language is so beautiful I never felt like translating his work – better learn Japanese and read and appreciate his poem in its original language I thought. But then, so many will miss out on his genius.

So I shall make an attempt out of love for his work.

宝だから

ほんとに大事なおのはあるだけでいい

ほんとに大切なヒトはいるだけでいい

何でも誰でもあることいることで始まっている

朝 空がある 曇っていても晴れていても

昼 友達がいる 気が合っても合わなくても

夜 働く人がいる 君が夢を見ている間に

たまには人間やめてもいいんじゃないか

キノコになって森にいてみる

クラゲになって海にいてみる

コトバになって意味をやめてみる

声になってアンナプルナを呼んでみる

自分にもどってぼんやりしてみる

生きていれば毎日毎時が宝だから

目も耳も口も鼻も手足も忙しい

シニカルな大爆笑も宝石みたいに輝いて

谷川俊太郎

Treasure

Truly valuable things are good enough just existing

Truly precious person is good enough just being

Anything anybody starts from just being

Morning being a sky whether cloudy or sunny

Noon being friends whether we get along or not

Night someone’s working while you are dreaming

Once in a while maybe stop being a human

Be a mushroom and try being in the forest

Be a jellyfish and try being in the ocean

Be a word and quit having a definition

Be a voice and call out for Annapurna

Return to being yourself and why not space out

Every hour every day, each a treasure as long as we are alive

Being a live, our eyes, ears, mouth, nose, limbs are always busy

Alive, even a roaring laughter of cynicism

shines and sparkles like a treasured jewel

Shuntaro Tanikawa

It’s probably like reading Shakespear translated into Japanese or Hafiz or Rumi into English… just got to read them in the original language. Read “Alone in Two Billion Light Years” (1952) in the original and feel the WONDER. First published when he was 21.

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凛としていてかっこいい! letter after death

A Letter

このたび私  年 月 日   にて
この世におさらばすることになりました。
これは生前に書き置くものです。
私の意志で、葬儀・お別れ会は何もいたしません。
この家も当分の間、無人となりますゆえ、弔慰の品は
お花を含め、一切お送りくださいませんように。
返送の無礼を重ねるだけと存じますので。

「あの人も逝ったか」と一瞬、たったの一瞬
思い出してくだされば、それで十分でございます。
あなたさまから頂いた長年にわたるあたたかな
おつきあいは、見えざる宝石のように、私の胸に
しまわれ、光芒を放ち、私の人生をどれほど豊かに
して下さいましたことか・・・。

深い感謝を捧げつつ、お別れの言葉に
代えさせて頂きます。

ありがとうございました。

年 月 日

茨木のり子の家 より

From Noriko Ibaragi’s Home

Noriko Ibaragi

Beautiful way to go Ibaragi Noriko, the poet…

She died alone as a widow and discovered at her home, two days after her death by a visiting relative. This letter was to be released after her death so the date and the cause of death is left blank. The cause of death was subarachnoid hemorrhage, a kind of brain aneurysm. She was 79, year 2006.

*******The Last Letter *****************************************

At this time ____ year ____month ____date

I am bidding farewell to this world.

This was written while I was alive.

My intention is for nothing like a funeral or a memorial. This house will likely to have no resident for awhile so including floweres, please do not send condolences. It would only unfold in rudeness in not responding.

Momentarily maybe muttering under one’s breath, “she too passed on”, just a mere murmur, an instant of rememberance is enough for me. The long years of our relationship is stored like a radiant rays of jewels in my heart, and that light had enriched my life.

I devote to you my deep gratitude and this appreciation is also my words as we part ways.

Thank you very much.

____ year _____ month_____date

最後までかっこよく美しすぎ…

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Ibaragi Noriko… a feminist

Here you go – another gem translated into English for you:

”女のひとのやさしさは Women’s kindness
長く世界の潤滑油であったけれど has long lubricated the world
それがなにを生んできたというのだろう?” but what has that produced?

”女がひとり頬杖をついて A women alone resting her chin on her hands
慣れない煙草をぷかぷかふかし blowing puffs of smoke, smoking a cigarette she’s not accumstomed to
ちっぽけな自分の巣と Going between her tiny nest
蜂の巣をつついたような世界の闇を and world of darkness as though pecking a bee hive
行ったり来たりしながら
怒るときと許すときのタイミングが unable to calibrate the timing for anger and foregiveness
うまく計れないことについて
まったく途方にくれていた she is at her wit’s end
それを教えてくれるのは when to get mad and when to forgive, that timing is taught not by
物わかりのいい伯母様でも a perceptive auntie
深遠な本でも nor a profound book
黴の生えた歴史でもないnor a moldy history growing more mildrews
たったひとつわかっているのは One truth she understands is that
自分でそれを発見しなければならない she has to uncover that on her own
ということだった”

「怒るときと許すとき」より

From “to be angry to forgive” by Noriko Ibaragi