Empty-handed I entered the world Barefoot I leave it My coming, my going Two simple happenings That got entangled
For each of us, the last day is coming, like the terminus of a transcontinental railroad trip. It’s far enough away to put out of mind, but we all know the end is coming. If the afterlife is unknowable, at least we can learn from others what pulling into the station feels like. Japanese death poems collects the final poems spoken or written before death over a period of hundreds of years. By alternating between poems and commentary, there is just enough context to make the different poems enjoyable, and the book proves surprisingly snackable. Many of the poems are simple imagery, in some way comforting of how one can approach the last days with a sense of awe and wonder.
Plum petals falling I look up-the sky a clear crisp moon
A bright and pleasant Autumn day to make death’s journey
Reading the condensed thoughts of Zen poets on their deathbeds is a satisfying lens on life. Perhaps by tying death with nostalgia and feelings of peace, many poems felt like a reminder to savor life, and there’s a comfort in believing that the last day is one to be enjoyed like any other. Yet in that way exists a silent exhortation to enjoy every day, for if you knew it was your last, you might try to enjoy it in the same way.
Today is the day for one last view of Mount Fuji
Many focus on the ephemerality of life - told not with disdain, but with a sense of naturalness that might only be possible so close to the end.
The snow of yesterday that fell like cherry petals is water once again
No sign in the cicada’s song that it will soon be gone
Festival of Souls yesterday I hosted them today I am a guest
The ones told with regret or humor may have made the most impression on me. The dying words of a poet still reflect a day and a state of mind that can be as varied as life. Perhaps my new motto on death is the following humorous death poem:
If your time to die has come and you die - very well! If you time to die has come and you don’t- all the better!
I’ve heard that ancient Japanese culture is one that is ‘obsessed with death’ but if this book is anything to go by, maybe the rest of us should pay a little more attention.
Other haikus I liked:
My whole long life I’ve sharpened my sword. And now, face to face with death I unsheathe it, and lo - The blade is broken- Alas!
Cicada shell little did I know it was my life
Farewell I pass as all things do dew on the grass
Winter ice melts into clean water clear is my heart
How leisurely the cherry blossoms bloom this year, unhurried by their doom
Fall, plum petals fall- and leave behind the memory of scent.
Ice in a hot world: my life melts.