Poetry at Sangam
Poetry at Sangam showcases poetry in English and translations as well as essays on poetics and news of new releases.
Sen no Rikyu (1522 – April 2, 1591) refined the Japanese tea ceremony to an art form. Once a friend of the powerful daimyo, feudal lord, Toyotomi Hideyoshi (1536/1537 – September 18, 1598), he fell victim to palace intrigues. The daimyo ordered his death.
Some things are in the wind
Like the fragrance of firs
In the first frost.
So I invited these five
Who had walked nearest me
Sat and shared so little, so much.
At such moments names do not matter
Just the depth each bond covers
Like all elements blanketed by mid-winter snow.
I dust, sweep and clean
This 4½ tatami mat room
And transform it into a thatched hut.
They enter the garden
I and many before me have tended
Of cushiony moss
Edged by gravel rivers
Raked around rocks that stand like mountains
Old with lichen.
I light the rare incense of spring
Which floats feathers
Of fleeting time.
They wait seated at the far end.
I pour fresh water in the low stone basin.
The sound of water on stone.
They step on whole or fragmented pathway-stones
I had sprinkled with water
And shaken a maple to scatter gold and crimson leaves on.
They pass the basin
As one leaves behind years.
Evening turns to dusk, a dusk that transcends the self.
The warrior leaves his sword.
They crawl through the humble, humbling opening
One by one
Daimyo, samurai, poet, peasant, merchant.
All are equal here.
Each bows to the scroll, the flower.
Each knows
The geometry of seating.
No colour disturbs
No sound mars
No word bruises the air.
Every gesture, manner, movement in accord.
A life-long study finds expression now.
The exact number of coals
The size of each
The order in which they are arranged
In their precise position
In the shape of a rounded branch
Cut cross-wise
Its bark still in tact
On a bed of sifted ash
So that they quickly light
Evenly burn and heat the water
At the proper time.
Pieces of iron are so arranged
In the kettle that a cicada
Hums of fading summer
At the first boil of mountain-spring water
When little fish-eye bubbles
Swim on the surface.
The finest leaves
As masters prescribed, were selected –
Creased like old leather
Curled like an opening petal
Wet like rain-swept earth
Soft as dappled shade
Aromatic as hills in the dry season
Which glisten like a lake touched by sun at dawn
And unfold like rising mist.
These I add at the second boil
When bubbles are like crystal beads
Rolling in a fountain.
At the third boil
When billows surge wildly
A dipperful of cold water settles the tea
Revives the youth of the water.
I serve.
In both hands we hold our cups
Raise them and sip.
What lingers of the world
Is warmed away.
We savour
The delicate bitterness
Like the after-taste of good counsel.
Those who do not know, speak.
Those who know, speak not.
They know.
When the tangible is shrouded
In the inexplicable
It is unwise even to attempt explanation
We leave the unexplainable, unexplained.
Here the nuances of the placed visual emanate
Our and their own artlessness.
Distilled austerity of brush-strokes
On the falling scroll –
Motion and transience in black.
Under it a single flower of the season
As if it were in the field
But drying, decaying, in a bamboo vase.
We engage in their enriching existence.
Our random inklings are brought to bear
On the actual and its actualities
That pale before what the actual stores as possibilities.
Here observation ignites imagination
In a slow smouldering way
Like mist over a frozen pond.
And frees the eye.
Each in his way, for a few stretched moments
Escapes the order issued.
There was no betrayal
No incriminating kiss or embrace
Of a friend or a follower.
Just a human trait.
I was too close to the great one
Too close for others’ comfort.
And yet what did my patron, despot, mean to me?
An occasional evening in this same room
With a different scroll
A different solitary flower
A different vase
The same ritual of tea
And some talk
Of perception and illusion
Of beauty unnoticed
In pebbles under running water
In a crack in a cup
In the decay of a knot in old timber
In a dandelion clock
Half denuded by the passing breeze.
The final sip.
Each places, with both hands
His empty bowl down.
Their eyes glaze as the inevitable
At last, finds expression
In the silence of a last sharing.
The eldest does not have to say it.
I place the utensils before him.
He takes each and looks
Perfecting its imperfection.
The process of perfecting
Is greater than perfection.
I present one to each.
My bowl, treasured above others
For the patina of generations
For the glaze only of ash
Rising in a wood-fired kiln
I keep.
Never again shall my bowl
Tainted by the lips of misfortune
Touch the lips of another man.
This vessel I, now, break.
Tea is over.
The guests get up.
They fight themselves
With trained restraint
And bow lingering goodbyes.
In that moment we unlearnt so much.
To my dearest disciple I gesture to stay.
Others leave.
Their cotton and silk garments
Swishing on the tatami mat
Like the wind through winter-dried rushes.
They do not look back.
I watch their backs recede
Move down the garden path they had come.
I remove the tea-gown
Fold it as it must be folded
Neatly, ready to be worn again, upon the mat.
The robe underneath
Is the white of coming snow.
This I untie.
He brings my samurai great-grandfather’s swords
Unfolds their sateen wrap
And lays them before my folded knees.
Beaten blades gleam
Their watered welcome.
They will relieve my lord
They will release him
Of his decree.
Some may say I go before my time.
But no time is before its time.
Although time has been
At times burdensome
It has been enabling.
And if I have not filled
My time with the immaculate
I have at least searched for it.
I have lived with the beautiful.
Now I can, must, beautifully exit.
The long one I leave for my pupil
To honour me
With one practiced stroke.
The short I take.
Its edge cuts into my left side.
A drop rubies out.
The blade now full in its mating
Is pushed down
Below the navel and pulled across.
I think of a single bamboo in a forest
Rising to meet the clouds
Tinted by the setting sun.