Winter Notes

Tanka by Hisashi Nakamura

Weak wintery rays

Embrace the naked branches

Of a silver birch.

Soon the trembling silhouette

Sinks into the silent dusk.

Bright sparks on the leaves

Of dead winter beech hedges

In the melting frost:

Captive sunrays hold back time,

Lost in a sea of amber.

On the icebound lake

The freezing mist swirls around

Under the starlight.

Who’s playing those frosty notes

Deep in the winter forest?

The gleam and whisper

Of windflowers in the shade

Are long gone by now.

The barren woods stand mutely

Against the whirling snow flakes.

Ravaged by the storm

The snowdrops have not lived long

By the garden hedge,

Vanished like melting snowflakes

On winter’s down drooping nape.

Now the spring rain falls

Day after day in silence

Over the wild moors,

Healing the wounds of the soul,

Seeping deep into the earth.

From velvet darkness

A fragrant pale pink appears

As the moon rises.

Streams of silent petals fall

Borne on the evening breeze.

April rosemary-

Against white spiraea sprays

Swinging in the breeze:

Out of the silky fine rain

Float up pale purple shadows.

As the fresh needles

Of the northern larch forest

Sift the cool moonlight,

A shadowy harp is touched

In the gently rising mist.

The yielding bamboos

Whitened by the passing rain

Rustle in rippling waves.

Phantom shadows drift away

Into a sea of lost time.

At the moonlit bay

The breeze over the cliffs faints

In the evening calm

As wild thyme scents the soft air

In tune with the cobalt tide.

He brought from Ireland

A lingering scent of turf

On cool briny air.

And he left with his old flute

Leaving a tune on the breeze.

The far meeting point

Of the sea and the pale sky

Trembles in the haze.

The warm sleeping dunes exhale

The remains of the summer.

The tempest has raged,

Wailing all through the black night

Over Lindisfarne.

On the rock the pale harebell

Trembles under the dawn sky.

Deep orange shadows

Change and drift over the dunes

In the waves of heat.

A cry comes from far away

Sinking into the burnt sand.

Hanging from the bows

Of an old rusty vessel

Tied to the pier

The black shadow of a cross

Falls on the neon red sea.

Stifled by the air

Laden with the rusty dust

Of the passing years

The dead cranes in the shipyard

Idly dangle their cables.

Stevedores rush home

After the long day’s labour

Like raging sea-waves.

Seagulls are whirling around

Against the hazy rusty dusk.

Left on a pontoon

Without a destination

The cargo remains.

Seagulls circle insanely

Screaming in the lurid dusk.

The September sun

Hidden in the milky dawn

Now shows a pale disc.

A huddle of sheep shadows

Looms out of the pearly mist.

In the warm stillness

Of an early autumn day

Apples turn to gold

As the gentle breeze brings home

The russet end of summer.

Floating in the warmth

Of the autumn afternoon

Red dragonflies drift

Through a sea of tender light

And on into the shadows.

October sunlight-

After a passing shower

Fluttering birch leaves

Against the lucid blue sky

Play tremolos of bright gems.

Against the pale sky

A silent sea of silver

Drifts in the cold air.

Thousands of mute travellers

Diffuse into the distance.

The stillness and warmth

Of the autumn day embrace

The wandering bee.

As the evening rays weaken

His shadow melts into the stone.

Stirred up by a tram

The fallen leaves drift idly

On the cobbled street.

A pale green facade fades out

Into a fine mist in Prague.

The huge baroque space

Is filled with exaltation

At the organ’s sound.

The dark ancient glass admits

A streak of sorrowful light.

Evening Chopin brings

Onto a blue marble floor

Bright scattered crystals.

Then flickering candles fill

The room with waltzing shadows.

Deep in the forest

Who is playing a nocturne

In the winter night?

The plaintive notes fall sadly

From the freezing starry sky.

As the crescent moon

Takes pity on the shadows

Of the freezing hedges,

From the blueish drifting mist

Floats out the winter jasmine.

Deep in the mountains

A snowflake falls from the tip

Of a bamboo leaf,

Touched by a spear of moonlight

In the stillness of midnight.

Winter night declines;

I hear flakes fall through bamboos,

Covering lost time.

Into the snow-lit darkness

A pale shadow slips away.

Memories entwined

In the swaying bamboo grove

At a winter inn.

The sake cup moon is blurred,

Touched by a melting snowflake.

The weak winter rays

Take my soul away from me

As I trudge along.

My long purple shadow sinks

Into the stillness of the road.

The huge evening sun

Lies low on the horizon

On midwinter day.

Its ominous red presence

Shoots my soul in the back.

In meditation

Through a night of rain and storm,

As I burn incense

The smoke in the lightning’s glare

Still ascends into stillness.

As I burn incense

In the stillness of the dawn

I hear the rain fall.

The ascending smoke fills up

The core of my empty heart.

The silent forest

Is whitened in the spring dusk

By the passing rain.

Sifted through the fresh needles

Breezes pass through the larch trees.

In a fresh shower

Of crystal morning sunrays

Under the larches,

The pure note of an oboe-

My shadowy self dissolves.

Deep in the birch wood

Lies a sea of dappled light

Over the bluebells.

A showery April breeze

Leads the windflowers astray.

Among the dark hills

Polished by the cold moonlight

The lake lay silent.

Now dewdrops from the larches

Send ripples as the dawn breaks.

In the misty rain

A solitary shadow

Stands still on the hill.

A dark cluster of cedars

Fades into the silent dusk.

Over the June moors

A skylark is sucked into

The wide timeless sky.

From the edge of blue stillness,

The faint bleating of a lamb.

A breathing faint light

In the innocent palms

Of a little girl;

In the surrounding darkness

She holds a captured firefly.

Newly mown hay scents

The briny air by the shore

In the evening calm.

As the summer day declines

The cobalt sea blazes up.

The end of summer-

The hydrangea in the rain

Floating mistily:

Pastel colours washed away,

Fusing into faded dreams.

In the morning sun

A ripe lemon in her hand

Fragrantly gleaming,

Filled with the warmth of the south

And tinged with tender sadness.

A red poppy field

In a sea of June sunlight

Under a blank sky;

From the cool innocent earth

Long gone wounded souls seep out.

Seas of sunflowers

Undulating in the heat

Under glaring blue.

Passing through their deep shadows,

An incandescent sadness.

Below the rock face

Under the midsummer sun

A black shadow lies.

As the silence sinks in

Sorrow oozes from the rock.

Choked by waves of heat

The dunes writhe in agony.

In the cobalt sky

The blazing white sun stands still

Gazing at me in silence.

The sound of a shot

Is lost in the lethargy

Of a summer day.

The blank blue sky lies mutely

Over the dull horizon.

The dry sand falls through

My idly listless fingers,

Gone without a trace.

My shadow escapes from me,

Lost under the scorching sun.

The blue sea spread out

Under a white noon-day sun

Sings a lullaby

To one who does not hear it,

Always waiting on the shore.

A slow sea journey-

I reach up to touch a star

In the vast darkness.

Our little boat crawls over

The blackness of the ocean.

The curled fallen leaves

Are rolled along the back street

As the sunlight dies.

From the gathering shadows

A sigh drifts through the silence.

The rustling of birch leaves

Among the silent larches

Is lost in the gloom.

The loneliness drifts into

The cold wind of autumn dusk.

The last train comes in-

A few travellers disperse

Into the damp fog.

Night silences the city

And a tabloid page whirls up.

After long absence

Greeted by a rolling tin

From a ruined wall,

Even lost winter seagulls

Ridicule the newcomer.

On a northern shore

Snowflakes are borne on the wind

Over roaring seas.

Is this today’s lullaby

For the gull lost at nightfall?

At Flamborough Head

Gone over the freezing cliffs

Into leaden skies,

No return, no going back

For the hovering seagull.

Suddenly her smile

Appears in the candle flame

Here in Notre Dame-

As the wind blows in the snow

Mother holds me near the fire.

Her warmth still remains

Deep in my chest like a flame

After fifty years.

With me on her back at dusk

She prayed to the evening star.

Under my bare feet

I feel the fine grain of wood

Of the temple floor;

The shadow of ancient eaves

Falls upon me as I pass.

The bare frozen moors

Under the pale morning sky

Are still startled.

Was it a cry in the night

That echoed through the dark dales?

In the piercing wind

An old icicle breaks off.

The still morning brings

Black figures against the snow

Under a bright blue heaven.

Their life-long struggle,

Their marching and their banners,

Have left no echo,

Like the wind in the bamboos

In a frosty winter dawn.

Through the empty nest

Lodged in the swaying branches

Of the churchyard elms

The winter moon gazes at

A name newly carved in stone.

They say no, no, no,

Trembling in the piercing breeze

Under wintry light.

In the shadows of gravestones

Snowdrops come year after year.

The limpid church bells

Melt into the empty sky

Without an echo.

A lone white bird disappears

Against the pale winter clouds.