Poetry

縁 (‘En’)

Fate. A thing I once mocked when intoxicated
with island whisky and thoughts of long ago.
There was no reason to it. No need
to bother myself with method, motive, reason.
There is no god, no other. Just ourselves
to blame for the cause of our misfortunes.

There you stood. A miracle
not even you could explain. The things you saw,
the things that were, now etched upon your mind,
a procession of perplexities
          only you could fathom.

          You thank the scars
          for bringing you here.

When I took in the words that were
          your story,
my ears burned. I closed my eyes,
tried to understand the lines, the tones.
How they danced around my head,
until correlations of colour
          struck me
                    with fear.
Once I had seen them,
I could not make them
                              go away.

My Fukushima became a nightmare.
amidst their faces and their screams,
the debris and the ghostly radiation,
stood there silently
          in the middle of it all
was you.

Your Fukushima was home.
Your composition, a requiem for home.
Your lyrical refrain was brought to our ears
by a beautifully strange coincidence.
Fate. A thing I once mocked when intoxicated.
We sat in the Red Deer, glass in hand,
Sobered by your words.

Ryan Bramley