From Yuri To Yuri: A Contemporary Renku Poem

From Yuri To Yuri: Japanese Womanhood Across Borders of Time
A Contemporary Renku Poem (A Work in Progress).
By Yuri Matsueda and Yuri Kageyama
Read at What the Dickens in Tokyo Oct. 5, 2008.

(1)

20年後あるいは30年後かの自分と対峙し
瞳の深淵をそっと覗き見る
睫毛の長さ
目元の影
声の艶
足首の締まり
それらは注意深く観察される

わずかな欲望はざらついた嫉妬へ
嫉妬は称賛
安堵へ
その移ろいをゆっくりと舌先で転がす昼下がり
私たちは松檮を歩いていた


(2)

pale hands folded over silken robes
music tangled like wind among pine trees
she waits, waits, waits for her daimyo lover

i can’t love a man i can’t respect
i fall for men who’re no good for me
i won’t love a man who might destroy me

her breasts grow fuller with each breath
she knows he will return in the darkness
her tongue is dry and sallow

i can’t resist a man who means danger
his cocky sneer, his sword, his dreams,
his probing lips and fingertips


(3)

月に照らされ

家族を忘れ
あなたを忘れ
過去を忘れ
大気を切り抜け
時間を走り
窓はふさがれ
耳はふさがれ
体はしめられ
心翔る

自由である

夜間飛行


(4)

walking
the path of time of generations of memories of ignorance

all the forgotten women
all the forgotten lovers
all the forgotten babies

walking
past Shibuya cobblestones of footprints of dreams of death

fading love hotels
gleaming boutiques
salesmen passing tissue to no one

walking
faceless voices blend with sirens and cicadas

overheard giggles
sheer wisps of thoughts
too lazy to speak the truth or lies

at dusk


(5)

一本先へ
一本奥へ
円山町を背にして
蝉の声に誘われ
さまよう
女二人
不意に途切れた
鳴き声の間に
白い腹をみせた
亡骸をまたいで
羽を散らした体を尻目に
松涛求めて
喘ぎ歩くも
跡なくあてなく
日、翳る


(6)

dot and line, dot and line
like marching ants spilling
from score sheets to table to equator to nightmares
black notations of silent thoughts of music
muted ramblings of an obscure composer
puttering notes only he and i can hear
fragments of jazz rhythms
broken crazed despised

did you know Ingmar Bergman was terrified of death
but as he grew older, as he approached that dreadful moment,
he was no longer afraid

did you know life is forever
when death comes
there will be no life to feel

i was lost when i was your age
you will help me find myself
at your age
with this poem