Tree

by Shuntarō Tanikawa 1931 - 2024 (photo by man of aran)

Tree (photo by alan girling)

Japanese poet, Shuntarō Tanikawa, lived 92 years. He died on November 13th of this year. He wrote more than 60 books of poetry. The poem below is from Selected Poems (trans. William I. Elliott & Kazuo Kawamura). Enjoy.

Tree
by Shuntarō Tanikawa (Naked, 1988)

Pretty soon I'll be a tree. 
The tip of my middle finger tingles
and sprouts green leaves. 
And then I find that
other leaves grow out of my ring finger, index finger, 
and my arms fork into limber branches. 
Inside my shirt my body 
becomes a rugged trunk. 
My toes dissolve into mud
and tepid water creeps up to my lower belly. 
I quit going to school. 
I quit playing baseball, quit fishing. 
I just stand still, even at night. 
Rain refreshes me. 
No one notices me at all. 
They just hurry by. 
Until the day I fade I go nowhere. 
I keep on rustling, swaying in the wind.