Peach blossoms in the back yard. Spring
Another earthquake hit Japan today, registering 6.5. Numerous dead and many more injured. It’s exactly 5 years since the horrible earthquake and tsunami hit Japan. The resilience of the Japanese people in the days and weeks after, the courageous work of the nuclear workers, some who sacrificed their lives and the more than 30,000 lives lost is something that can not be forgotten. Today, another earthquake in the southwestern part of Japan. At this point, there isn’t a tsunami on the horizon. The center of the quake was in an urban area and much destruction of buildings and searches for survivors are going on right now.
Then, I wrote three poems about the earthquake, shocked by the destruction. I present two of them in sympathy, with great compassion for what the Japanese people are once again facing.
Lady Nyo
1.
Is there a moon viewing party
In Japan tonight?
Destruction, sorrow
Covers the land,
Despair, loss
Regulates the heart.
Perhaps the moon presence
Is of little interest
And less comfort.
Perhaps sorrow goes too deep
To raise eyes above the debris.
Yet,
Her gleam falls upon all
A compassionate blanketing
Of the Earth,
Softening the soiled,
Ravaged landscape,
A beacon of promise
Of the return to life,
Beauty to nature.
—————————-
cherry blossoms from Sendai
2. ————————————-
Two weeks and the cherry blossoms
Would have opened in Sendai.
Beautiful clouds of scented prayers
Falling upon upturned faces,
The eternal promise of hope for the earth,
Swept out to sea
With a good part of humanity.
I will sit beneath the moon tonight
Listening to frogs sing,
An owl in the woods
The birds settling in the dark—
My cherry tree is blooming
A small cloud of satin blossom–
I will count falling petals,
And offer these
as prayers.
–
Jane Kohut-Bartels
Copyrighted, 2011-2014
