IMPERIAL HOTEL (TEIKOKU HOTERU, 1926)
Frank Lloyd Wright’s famous hotel, which was built in 1915 and survived the Great Kantō Earthquake of 1923, was a celebrated meeting place for foreign dignitaries and celebrities.
I
This is the West
The dogs use English
This is the proper West
The dogs invite me to the Russian Opera
This is the West A Western Exposition
The Japanese marketplace for kimono and shopworn curios
And this is a prison
The guard jangles his keys
This is a dreary, damp, dank prison
Neither the prisoners nor the wardens trade words with a soul
And the prisoners are called by number
And the guards stand in the exits / the entranceways
And then this is a cheap dive
The old fat guy is roaring drunk
And also this is a cheap whorehouse
The women walk naked
And this is a hole
Black and fetid
II
A large hole
A large whorehouse
A large saloon
A large dampish prison
A big and seedy sample Japanese marketplace
Undestroyed even by the earthquake
In the center of Tokyo
Over our heads
Squats, letting loose a stench
SONG (UTA, 1926)
You, Don’t sing
Don’t sing of flowery grasses or dragonfly wings
Don’t sing of the wind’s whispering or the smell of woman’s hair
All those weak things
All those uncertain things
All gloomy things—brush them aside
Reject all elegance
Sing of solely the honest parts
Parts that will fill the belly
Sing of that very edge where it pierces from the chest
Songs that spring back from being knocked down
Songs that draw up strength from the depths of shame
Those sorts of songs
Clear out fumigate your heart
Fill out your lungs
Sing out in severe rhythm
Those sorts of songs
Pound into the chests of the people going by going by
PAUL CLAUDEL (POORU KUROODERU, 1927)
Paul Claudel, a famous Catholic poet and diplomat, became France’s ambassador to Japan in 1921.
Paul Claudel was a poet
Paul Claudel was an ambassador
And France occupied the Ruhr
Romain Rolland fled to Jesus
Vladimir Ilyich returned to Russia
And Paul Claudel wrote poetry
Japan sent troops to Siberia
Fatty Semenov came running
And Paul Claudel wrote poetry
The farmers of France saved their money
The rich took that away
And the rich prayed to Mary
And Paul Claudel prayed to Mary
And Paul Claudel became the French ambassador to Japan
And Paul Claudel wrote poetry
Paul Claudel wrote poetry
Paul Claudel circled the moat
Paul Claudel played the shamisen
Paul Claudel danced kabuki
Paul Claudel did foreign relations
Ahh and then
Finally one day
Paul Claudel
Memorialized Charles-Louis Philippe
The ambassador on Philippe!
Ahh the great Paul Claudel!
Paul Claudel ambassador they say is a poet
“Our little Philippe” will
From within his humble grave most likely say
“Paul Claudel became ambassador?”
TRAIN (KISHA, 1927)
Section 3 (of 3)
Bye Bye Bye Bye
Good-bye Good-bye Good-bye Good-bye
We saw that
We heard that
A hundred factory gifts alight
Where a thousand factory girls ride on.
What are factory girls?
What are mill factory girls?
What are companies factories chimneys dormitories?
What does it mean that the girls are wrung out
What does it mean that they are wrung our like wet towels?
And what is New Year’s?
What is New Year’s break?
Ahh—the girls have been thoroughly wrung out
And pushed out—in the name of New Year’s
And we saw that
A hundred factory girls alight where a thousand factory girls ride on
And we saw that
Fathers and mothers and brothers and sisters come out from the snow
Atop their oil-papered raincoats
Atop their capes
Atop their wraps the white snow collecting
And their straw shoes wet all the way along up
And we saw how they and the girls embraced
And we saw that
They and the girls stroking each other
They and the gifts stroking each other’s heads and faces and shoulders
And how the snow kept falling on
Bye Bye Bye Bye
And the girls knew
That only for a while they were able to embrace
Only just a while for giving pats receiving pats
Ah—the girls knew
Who they themselves are
Where their villages are
And what sorts await in the village
The girls were pushed out in the name of New Year’s
The girls were thoroughly wrung out
And in the villages new buyers for them making all the rounds
Leaving those small stations
Through the snow
The girls are returning to the buyers there in ambush
This they all knew
Bye Bye Bye Bye
Good-bye Good-bye Good-bye Good-bye
That there was Etchū
That there the land of special treats for the rich
Atop the dirt floor exposed to the wind in that small station
Daughters and parents and brothers and sisters each patted the other
The parting words of those who sit and those who keep riding
Of the girls probably to be bought and rebought up again by different factories
Of the mill factory girls probably never to meet again
The chorus of their thousand voices
Spun round and round that never stopping sky of snow
THE RATE OF EXCHANGE (KAWASE SŌBA, 1936)
The words in italics originally were censored.
If Japan is
That different from all of the countries of the world
Even if Nihonjin
Is read as NIPPONJIN The sound sounds good
If we’re that different from all the foreigners in the world
Tell me how you tell yourself apart
If one yen is not two marks
And it happens that it’s not a half a mark
If on the whole the yen is not a mark and not a pound or a ruble or any of these things
What is this darn thing called one yen
I know The professors taught me
Said some long ago know-nothing barbarian uncivilized folks
Used some sort of clamshells for their cash
And now even the professors
Don’t even know how many yews a shell.
On the front the chrysanthemum’s 16 petals
On the back rippling waves and cherry blossom flowers
This is then my own 10 sen
And thrown into the bargain a hole like they didn’t used to have
And by the way why do the mails
If all foreigners are unrefined
Putting on the front of their coins kings and presidents and sickles and hammers
Arri
ve at these far destinations
Why do “cheap and quality Japanese goods”
Have their way in foreign markets?
Soon all sorts of geniuses
Trying to make theory from all this
Will be suffering for sure
But that is fruitless effort
They’ve got to learn the exchange rate
And I for one Even if you don’t know
I know the international clamshell exchange
Translated by Miriam Silverberg
POETRY IN TRADITIONAL FORMS
AKUTAGAWA RYŪNOSUKE
Although best remembered as a writer of short fiction, some of which is included in this anthology, Akutagawa Ryūnosuke (1892–1927) also earned a considerable reputation as a writer of haiku, which he began to compose shortly after his graduation from college. When he was thirty-five, suffering from an ever more uncontrollable nervous disorder, he took an overdose of sleeping pills and died, a celebrated suicide that, for many people, marked the end of an epoch.
Sick and feverish
in the gleam of cherry blossoms
I keep shivering.
netsu wo yande
sakura akari ni
furue iru
Slime on the stones—
gloomily through the water
the rays of the sun.
ishi no aka
monouki mizu no
hizashi kana
Unable to stand
with the stillness, it falls—
summer camellia
shizukasa ni
taezu chiri-keri
natsu-tsubaki
Translated by Makoto Ueda
KITAHARA HAKUSHŪ
Kitahara Hakushū (1885–1942), who wrote poetry in forms other than the tanka included here, was influenced by the idea of art for art’s sake and the cult of Europe imported at the turn of the twentieth century. His first collection, published in 1913, reveals his fascination with French symbolism and his predilection for exotic topics, including an interest in the “Christian century” in Japan, which continued to play an central role in his poetic conceptions throughout his career.
Birds of spring,
Don’t sing, please don’t sing!
A blaze of red
In the grass outside my window,
The sun sets this evening.
Haru no tori
na naki so naki so
aka-aka to
to no mo no kusai ni
hi no iru yū be
My senses are stirred
By the fluffy fragrance of
Fukura naru
boa no nioi wo
A feather boa:
A secret meeting with her
One morning in November
atarashimu
jūichigatsu no
asa no aibiki
Translated by Donald Keene
A summer mist
Enveloping those dark leaves
Perfumes the air.
In my youth I saw
And did not see.
Kaguroba ni
shizumite niou
natsu kasumi
wakakaru ware wa
mitsutsu mizariki.
Completely blind
Yet ever gentle.
What secret did you cherish,
Saintly monk,
Within those eyes?
Shiihatete
naoshi yawara to
masu mami ni
hijiri nani wo ka
yadoshitamaishi
Translated by Margaret Benton Fukasawa
An ailing child
Plays a harmonica
Into the night
Above the cornfield
A yellow moon in ascent
yameru ko wa
hamonika wo fuki
yo ni irinu
morokashibata no
ki naru tsuki no de
Translated by Makoto Ueda
The moon god’s light
outside
is bright and clear
And I who think this
am like water
tsukiyomi wa
hikari sumitsutsu
to ni maseri
kaku omou ware ye
misu no gotokaru
Translated by Janine Beichman
MITSUHASHI TAKAJO
One of the most noted women haiku poets of the twentieth century, Mitsuhashi Takajo (1899–1963) first wrote haiku under the tutelage of Yosano Akiko and Wakayama Bokusui. In the 1920s, she had become a poet of distinction. In the postwar years, her books of literary criticism earned her considerable attention as well.
climb this tree
and you’ll be a she-devil—
red leaves in the sunset glow
kono ki noboraba
kijo to narubeshi
yūmomiji
a woman stands
all alone, ready to wade
across the Milky Way
onna hitori
tateri ginga wo
wataru beku
falling leaves
falling leaves falling leaves
falling on my bed too
ochiba
ochiba ochiba
fushido no naki nimo furu
their lives last
only while aflame—
a woman and a pepper pod
moyuru ma ga inochi
onna to
tōgarashi
the aged person
wanting to become a tree
embraces a tree
sue wa ki ni
naritai rōjin
ki wo idaki
among thousands
of singing insects, one
singing out of tune
sen no mushi
naku ippiki no
kuruinaki
Translated by Makoto Ueda
OGIWARA SEISENSUI
Ogiwara Seisensui (1885–1976) is remembered primarily as one of the most adventuresome haiku poets of his day. In addition, he was much admired for his translations of German literature into Japanese, particularly of Goethe. Ogiwara’s personal life had many sides. After a series of deaths in the family, he became a Buddhist mendicant priest for a time, and religious sentiments can be found in his work during this period. Among the unusual qualities of his haiku was his emphasis on so-called free-style haiku, which omits seasonal words and often stresses irregular word divisions and repetitions of sounds.
It walks the sky, cloudless,
clear: the moon alone
sora wo ayumu
rō-rō to tsuki hitori
Translated by Janine Beichman
Morning with a baby crying with all its might
And a crowing rooster.
Chikara ippai ni naku ko to
naku tori to no asa.
I suck at
The sour tangerine of
Memories of my wife.
Tsuma no tsuioku
no suppai mikan wo
suute iru.
Translated by Donald Keene
OKAMOTO KANOKO
Despite the vicissitudes of her personal life and loves, Okamoto Kanoko (1889–1939) continued to write tanka, especially after Yosano Akiko took an interest in them. In the 1930s, Okamoto became a friend of the novelist Kawabata Yasunari, who encouraged her to write prose, and her later stories are much valued.
innately reserved
a silkworm does not cry
The Columbia Anthology of Modern Japanese Literature: From Restoration to Occupation, 1868-1945: vol. 1 (Modern Asian Literature Series) Page 92
