Best Nippon Poems
Many times the ocean
has saved Nippon, pearl of the sea,
an oceanic symbiosis a speck in a fecund see.
The dikes of man such miniscule plans to hold back the tide.
The throngs, each and all crawl across the thin skin of volcanic soil
or rise with in the hump-backed alps of remnant cones.
Yet, the sea rises to reclaim its own
scour the pallet of man, refine, burnish melt, reform.
With pen and sword kanji drawn, samurai born
with knife and bone entrails torn, honor tested
tested by the hand of He,
tested and found worthy.
The children of the Divine Wind
rise above the tsunami, as one, unbowed.
Pipe Dreams
Though I have a woman’s heart; it pounds with
dragon’s fire. Curled about the core of self,
I have lain in wait for Asia with claw, and horn.
Linked-locks and keys have spined beneath my hand
upon the tourist’s rails of China’s Great Wall where
builder’s bones rattle for redress upon the wind.
It is not China’s Long but Ryu ’s heart which pounds.
This was no place, no place for me.
Paper boats zhezhi have blessed my dreams. The
Divine Wind eases my way across a sea of longing
to Nippon. My two-chambered
heart can have but one loyalty—
I say no to the soldiers,
strident in beige and red—
Senkaku’s waves buoy me.
Buddhist temples waver mirage-like in
a gray-white haze of frankincense, the scent
of ever after, lays about me.
For links of love and family, are stronger,
than those of coercion and the gun—I will
island shelter—refine remnants—separate myself
from clay become porcelain—
beneath tori arches; I walk.
A stream in Kyoto
a bronze statue of a ballerina
dancing on point
within a circle
of gnats—
First Published in the Spring of 2017 by Illumen
The artist Hokusai memorialized,
In his woodblock print of raging seas,
The great wave off Kanagawa,
That brought Nippon to its knees.
Again the modern rising sun is caught,
In the wrath of shifting plates,
And the belch of a feral tsunami,
Which left millions unsure of their fates
Waves swallowed the archepelico.
Mount Fuji stood at the ready to defend.
The islands won the battle with nature,
But Japans ill's will take years to mend.
Grace and will fills the souls of surviviors
Ancestors fortitude flows through their veins.
They will try to accept lifes yin and yang,
While resolving the tragedy that remains.
The flying cranes wings are strong.
Broad and feathered to deal with lifes tests.
Through centuries they have learned many lessons,
On how to rebuild and strengthen their nests.
The first time the Japanese were stopped in World War 2...
was 7th of September 1942...(Before Gaudacanal fight was finished)...they retreated then
back to Rabaul after heavy fighting with the Aussies in the muddy swamp at Milne Bay, New
Guinea...
http://www.scullywag.com/kokoda1942stoush/
Milne Bay Battle 1942...
In the mud of east New Guinea by the shores of Milne Bay..
The Yanks had laid an airstrip made of mesh or so they say...
It was 1942 the Japanese would land...
Never beaten till this point, unbeatable so grand...
2 Squadrons of Yank Kittyhawk's all covered in the mud...
Flown by game Australians who spilled the Nippon blood...
Six 50 cal machine guns on the Kitty they did sit...
Bullets wobbled down the barrels, sank the barges just a bit...
Fighter Ace our Truscott he'd often lead the charge..Bluey...
He'd barely left the airstrip, wheels up, strafe a barge...
Barges full of soldiers packed in like sardines....
And on this beach the slaughter of the Japanese Marines...
The rain came down in torrents never dry, how would you be....
Aussie soldier were in battle in mud up to their knees...
So driven from this swamp were the awful Japanese...
By the 7th of September, what weren't dead were glad to flee...
Don Johnson
Speechless
Beauty of Dress
Beauty of Speechless
Skidding on the Rails
Why? I cannot hear.
I cannot speak.
Like me.
Divergent hole, speechless.
We can dance.
Eat.
See.
But not hear.
I am not too distant.
Nippon Weapon
So what do I say to them?
Dance to it?
Sunshine, Living to the end. Effect of the night.
News of the sword.
Crucify the bad. What are you – a fool?
Of course I am.
TV Actuality.
TV Factuality
Speechless to hear, healthcare.
Black or White, Lips open or closed. Read the magazine.
But I cannot Speak
It is factual
Through my Lips
Cause of my smile
I stand here for many days alone
And enjoy the rays and the cool breeze that falls upon
But I become very sad seeing on
My brothers and sisters are being cut down around
By bombs and missiles by some odd and cruel men;
Just the day before a sister of mine
Was shot down by a monster Zion
He was scolded and his action was condemned
By a man of humanity whose good name is John
But for the other cases of rape and murder around the world
Humanity gone into bins
And to prevent the heinous crimes there is none;
In the wee hours Today came a smart girl
A young lady may be she is about twenty two or twenty three
Before I know anything she took nine pictures
By her Nippon camera with a smile and that too is for free;
Perhaps one day like my brothers and sisters, I will die
With smart bombs and tamarack missiles
But today I have enough reasons to be happy
And on my round face to have a big smile
As someone inside me has seen a tinge of my folded beauty.
Peter has gotten a new job
as a bookstore clerk from one to ten
down by the river
in a sunny little house.
I've come to visit and I'm thumbing through
a book of poems
by Robinson Jeffers' brother.
Incoherent but
more interesting than this.
Out of the river rises a bum of a blob
dripping with water and begging a yen.
While he shivers
I call him a louse
and say This isn't Nippon, you!
So off he roams
probably back to his mother.
He was a nut
because he wasn't a fish.
In the place of the rising sun
Where fasts break on sushi
And the sumo's size a delight
The earth wriggles – wets our kimonos
Took stuffs up to origami
And dampens muses for haiku
As the sunrise
We are in Nippon
Together!
Kokoda 1942 See-saw battle
Red blood was a running, emerald green saw it pour,
In the mountains of Kokoda, death on the see-saw,
400 fifteen to eighteen year old boys knew the score,
Just ole .303 rifles to stop the Nip. for evermore,
YANK
General Macarthur was screaming in Melbourne haw, haw,
He’d just escaped from the Phillipines ,
Where the planning it was flawed,
Where lots of his fighters,
Still grounded, burnt, what bloody for?
His conferences went on,
as the Nip fighter planes scored.
Gona and Buna New Guinea.
Ten to 13 thousand Nipponese attacked from the shore,
Just 100 boy soldiers tried to hold em up some more,
Like soldier ants a-coming Nip. flowed round the sides,
Cut off in the jumgle, crawl away on belly slide,
Or your blood an guts on the green jungle floor?
Run Rabbit run said Aussie General Blamey and it gnawed,
Boy soldiers they tried, Nippon, swarm a coming poured,
Big brothers would stop em second 25th Brigade coming ensured,
{3 battalions 2500 men}
Irabiawa great slaughter,
Nippon retreat from, with no bloody score!
Don Johnson
What really irked the 39th battalion of boys ,
fighting on the sides of 7 to 10 thousand feet high,
jungle enveloped mountains,
where you never saw the sun.
Was the screaming Macarthur, “die, defending Australia,”
and the Aussie general Blamey
“run rabbit run”
you retreated or died as the swarm flowed around and over you?
Choices hey….would you have stayed till death with your ten shot 303?
The Nips had and used 75mm mountain guns British made,
the shells exploded in the trees above you shrapnel would kill you.
Nambu Woodpecker machine guns and Mortars too,
versus .Lee Enfield 303 rifles….not good odds:{
10,000 Nips versus 400 boys….
The older boys were all in the Middle East fighting Churchills',
war against Hitler and Mussolini....
—– My life at seventy-three, amazing, yet there are times when its blue. In context, a haibun is of the now, not the future, or past. Oh, references can be made, in context, to ether, with qualifiers. So, today, for me has been a quest, Japanese poem rules investigated, cross-referenced, and found abused. No expert am I, but I do seek the truth. No wish to disrespect, or be aloof, but, when there are rules it is for good reason. However, a thought just occurred reference Japanese to English syllable counts. Using the Japanese ‘on’ format, Nippon has four syllables, yet if used in an English haiku only two. So, if Nagasaki and Nippon were used in one line using the ‘on‘ format that would constitute 8 syllables, in English only 6. I have always been aware syllable counts varied between languages, my thought however, could be considered an insubordinate tongue in cheek account, read on.
—— Way back when, and as to how far back I don’t, or cant say, but what I can, is that over the eons of time, secrets have been transcribed, and passed between folk, ether conveying endearments, useful information, or as with senryu, cynical, or humorous comments on, ether ones own foibles, or those of others. Reference can be found that both tanka and haiku, (not 100% sure on the latter), were used secretly by lovers to confirm their love for each other, and the shorter the poem, the smaller, and more easily concealed was the parchment.
As to who came up with the restrictions, reference the syllable counts, and for what reasons I can only surmise, and that is smaller is better. Move over big guy.
me said nature
created the spoken word
transcribe it wisely
My life at seventy-two, amazing, yet there are times when its blue. In context, a haibun is of the now, not the future, or past. Oh, references can be made, in context, to ether, with qualifiers. So, today, for me has been a quest, Japanese poem rules investigated, cross-referenced, and found abused. No expert am I, but I do seek the truth. No wish to disrespect, or be aloof, but, when there are rules it is for good reason. However, a thought just occurred reference Japanese to English syllable counts. Using the Japanese ‘on’ format, Nippon has four syllables, yet if used in an English haiku only two. So, if Nagasaki and Nippon were used in one line using the ‘on‘ format that would constitute 8 syllables, in English only 6. I have always been aware syllable counts varied between languages, my thought, however, could be considered an insubordinate tongue in cheek account, read on. Way back when, and as to how far back I don’t, or cant say, but what I can, is that over the eons of time, secrets have been transcribed, and passed between folk, ether conveying endearments, useful information, or as with senryu, cynical, or humorous comments on, ether ones own foibles or those of others. Reference can be found that both tanka and haiku, (not 100% sure on the latter), were used secretly by lovers to confirm their love for each other, and the shorter the poem, the smaller, and more easily concealed was the parchment.
As to who came up with the restrictions, reference the syllable counts, and for what reasons I can only surmise, and that is smaller is better. Move over, big guy.
me said nature
created the spoken word
transcribe it wisely
If streets had beats,
Ours would be steady,
Diversity beautifies Mt. Airy,
The veins of life are blue and bright;
Here,
Nature revives our lives,
The grace of spring arrives,
I hear the children at play,
Today is pleasant,
Today is positive,
I feel so alive.
A GI looking for nookie
Met a Geisha girl called Suki
Would you believe
She could conceive
Faster than a New York bookie?
When blackened at that time,
as the fate of this country,
In the Dai Nippon colonial era,
the baby was born.
Childbirth is true fate.
breastfeeding as God's gift,
laudatory nature and remarkable deeds.
Nothing for partus sequitur ventrem,
children born not to slaves.
Mom, who nine-monthed him,
happy and grateful.
The baby was exceptional.
The Colonial Army never sets claws,
unexpected obstacles,
grounding and sinking.
Where?
Who?
Naqaba, walked,
followed a narrow path.
The Guru,
Sekumpul.
Father's Dislike
American hero, a man my father would ing hate, was a real golden ball boy. Olympic athlete, he saw and did it all. Jessie Owens, Nazi Berlin, history being made.Making history.Joined the air force. Flying Liberators over the Pacific,
bombing the Nips. Sent out in a piece of junk, engine failure, into the drink.Escaped the sinking bomber. Hell starts here. Weeks adrift in life rafts. Braving sharks, typhoons and strafing Nip bombers. His mates died. Finally rescue, sent to hell,
again. Picked up by a Nip ship.Taken to various prison camps.Beaten to an inch of his life, many times.Seeing brutality and death, again. Finally, the hell of war was over. Back to glory land to build a life. Later, returning to the land of Nippon, not for
revenge but forgiveness. Only his old jailer, named The Bird, refused to meet him. A story told, milked by the Yanks, with a message: war is death, there is no glory. Forgiveness can happen but is any of the necessary? Death, violence,
destruction, bloodlust killing? Nothing is learnt, each generation gets it own war, death painting the land red. And so it goes on. It will never end till the last heart stops beating. Then peace will reign. In a world free of Man. Only then, will war be over.