“
Now reading
The Decadent Poets of Kyoto
Their poetry is remembered for a detailed calligraphy hard to decipher, less factual than fireflies in the night: the picture-letters, the characters, the stuff their words were made from were part of the meaning. A word like "summer" included a branch of plum blossoms, writing about "summer in a city street" carried the weight of the blossoming branch, while "a walk on a summer afternoon" carried the same beautiful purple shade. They dealt with such matters distractedly, as though "as though" were enough-as though the little Japanese woman with the broom returning to her husband's grave to keep it tidy was less loving than the handsome woman in the café off the lobby of the Imperial Hotel, who kissed the inside of her lover's wrist. Their public representations now shadows, their generals and admirals took musicians with them to war, certain their codes would not be deciphered, in an age when hats and rings were signs of authority and style. They thought their secrets were impenetrable, they thought they had the power to speak and write and not be understood, they could hide the facts behind a gold-leaf screen of weather reports. It was Buddha who had an ear for facts: coins dropping into the ancient cedar box, hands clapping, the sound of temple bells and drums. Codes were broken, ships sank, men screamed under the giant waves, and a small hat remained afloat longer than a battleship. 2s