retreat.”
“So it wouldn’t matter to him if there weren’t any guests, then.”
“Is this your first visit, sir?”
“No, I came through once a long time ago.”
The conversation flags. I open up my sketchbook again and peacefully set about sketching the chickens. Then, deep in the quietness, the soft clang of a distant horse bell begins to penetrate my ears. It sets up a rhythm inside my head that grows into a kind of tune. It’s like the dreamy feeling of being half aware, as you doze, of the soft, insistent sound of a hand mill turning next door. I pause in my sketching to jot down on the side of the page
Spring wind—
in Izen’s ears the sound
of a horse’s bell. 5
I have already come across five or six horses on my way up the mountain, all of them elaborately girthed in the old style, and belled. They seemed scarcely to belong to the present world.
Before long the tranquil strains of a packhorse driver’s song break through my poetic reveries of an unpeopled path winding on among empty mountains into the far depths of spring. There is something carefree within the plaintive sorrow of that singing voice, and it strikes my ears as might a song from a painting.
The driver’s song
crossing Suzuka’s far pass—
spring rain falling. 6
Having jotted these words diagonally on the page, I realize it is not in fact my own poem. 7
“Someone else has come,” remarks the old woman, half to herself.
Since there is only one path across the mountains, all who come and go must pass her teahouse. Each of those five or six horses I’ve met would have come down the path, and climbed back up it again, to these same murmured words. Here in this tiny settlement, strewn blossom-deep wherever feet might tread, down the years she has counted the bells, through the changeless springs along the hushed and lonely road, till now her hair is white with the years of counting. Turning over a page, I write
The driver’s song—
white hair untouched by color
spring draws to its end.
But the poem doesn’t manage to express all I’m feeling; it will need some further thought. Staring at the tip of my pencil, I am pondering how I might combine the phrase “white hair” with “age-old melody” and the theme words “the driver’s song,” add a season word for spring, and put it all into a haiku’s seventeen syllables, when a loud voice cries “Hello there!” and in front of the shop stands the packhorse driver himself.
“Well, well, so it’s you, Gen. You’re off down to town again, eh?”
“If you have anything you want from there, just let me know and I’ll bring it up for you.”
“Well then, if you’re passing through the Kaji-cho area, could you bring me a Reigan Temple talisman for my daughter?”
“Right, I’ll get one for you. Just one? Your Aki’s made a fine marriage. It’s a happy thing. Isn’t that so?”
“Praise be, she wants for nothing in daily life. I suppose that’s a happy thing, yes.”
“Of course it is! Just compare her with the Nakoi girl.”
“Yes, poor thing. And so good-looking too. Is she any better these days?”
“Nah, just the same as ever.”
“What a shame!” The old woman heaves a sigh.
“A shame it is,” Gen agrees, stroking his horse’s nose.
The rain that has streamed out of that distant sky is still held pooled in every leaf and blossom of the luxuriantly branching cherry tree nearby, and a passing gust of wind chooses this moment to catch the tree off guard, so that it finds itself toppling the heavy drops down from their precarious home aloft, with a sudden shower of sound. Startled, the horse tosses its long mane up and down.
“Whoa there!” scolds Gen, his voice combining with the clanging of the horse’s bell to break through my meditations.
“You know, Gen,” the old woman goes on, “I can still see before my eyes the sight of her when she went off as a bride. Sitting there on the horse, in that lovely long-sleeved wedding kimono with
“So it wouldn’t matter to him if there weren’t any guests, then.”
“Is this your first visit, sir?”
“No, I came through once a long time ago.”
The conversation flags. I open up my sketchbook again and peacefully set about sketching the chickens. Then, deep in the quietness, the soft clang of a distant horse bell begins to penetrate my ears. It sets up a rhythm inside my head that grows into a kind of tune. It’s like the dreamy feeling of being half aware, as you doze, of the soft, insistent sound of a hand mill turning next door. I pause in my sketching to jot down on the side of the page
Spring wind—
in Izen’s ears the sound
of a horse’s bell. 5
I have already come across five or six horses on my way up the mountain, all of them elaborately girthed in the old style, and belled. They seemed scarcely to belong to the present world.
Before long the tranquil strains of a packhorse driver’s song break through my poetic reveries of an unpeopled path winding on among empty mountains into the far depths of spring. There is something carefree within the plaintive sorrow of that singing voice, and it strikes my ears as might a song from a painting.
The driver’s song
crossing Suzuka’s far pass—
spring rain falling. 6
Having jotted these words diagonally on the page, I realize it is not in fact my own poem. 7
“Someone else has come,” remarks the old woman, half to herself.
Since there is only one path across the mountains, all who come and go must pass her teahouse. Each of those five or six horses I’ve met would have come down the path, and climbed back up it again, to these same murmured words. Here in this tiny settlement, strewn blossom-deep wherever feet might tread, down the years she has counted the bells, through the changeless springs along the hushed and lonely road, till now her hair is white with the years of counting. Turning over a page, I write
The driver’s song—
white hair untouched by color
spring draws to its end.
But the poem doesn’t manage to express all I’m feeling; it will need some further thought. Staring at the tip of my pencil, I am pondering how I might combine the phrase “white hair” with “age-old melody” and the theme words “the driver’s song,” add a season word for spring, and put it all into a haiku’s seventeen syllables, when a loud voice cries “Hello there!” and in front of the shop stands the packhorse driver himself.
“Well, well, so it’s you, Gen. You’re off down to town again, eh?”
“If you have anything you want from there, just let me know and I’ll bring it up for you.”
“Well then, if you’re passing through the Kaji-cho area, could you bring me a Reigan Temple talisman for my daughter?”
“Right, I’ll get one for you. Just one? Your Aki’s made a fine marriage. It’s a happy thing. Isn’t that so?”
“Praise be, she wants for nothing in daily life. I suppose that’s a happy thing, yes.”
“Of course it is! Just compare her with the Nakoi girl.”
“Yes, poor thing. And so good-looking too. Is she any better these days?”
“Nah, just the same as ever.”
“What a shame!” The old woman heaves a sigh.
“A shame it is,” Gen agrees, stroking his horse’s nose.
The rain that has streamed out of that distant sky is still held pooled in every leaf and blossom of the luxuriantly branching cherry tree nearby, and a passing gust of wind chooses this moment to catch the tree off guard, so that it finds itself toppling the heavy drops down from their precarious home aloft, with a sudden shower of sound. Startled, the horse tosses its long mane up and down.
“Whoa there!” scolds Gen, his voice combining with the clanging of the horse’s bell to break through my meditations.
“You know, Gen,” the old woman goes on, “I can still see before my eyes the sight of her when she went off as a bride. Sitting there on the horse, in that lovely long-sleeved wedding kimono with
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