English translation of the prose
AI-assisted English translation of the prose; quoted poems remain in Japanese. The Japanese original remains authoritative.
Originally published: 1 April 2026.
Japan Romantic Poetry Forum: Autumn, Kannazuki
18 October 2025
Record and commentary: 河内裕二, Japan Romanticism Society
Expo 2025 Osaka, Kansai closed on 13 October. More than twenty-five million people visited over its 184 days. An acquaintance who went told me it was so crowded that the popular pavilions were completely inaccessible, so I gave up going. Before opening, the Expo faced criticism over construction delays, rising costs, and other issues, but reports say its operating budget, separate from construction costs, ended in surplus. The official mascot, Myaku-Myaku, was unpopular at first but somehow became enormously popular, even entering the top ten of the 2025 buzzword awards. An Expo is a kind of festival, and when it ends one feels rather lonely. The next is scheduled for Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, in 2030, reportedly at four times Osaka’s scale.
The gathering was held on 18 October at Miura City Workers’ Civic Center; the source gives its starting time as 01:30. Participants were 三宅尚道, president of the Miura Tanka Association, 嘉山光枝, 嶋田弘子, 清水和子, 羽床員子, 安田喜子, Seishu Hamano, president of the Japan Romanticism Society, Jun Hayama, and 河内裕二. 加藤由良子 and Yukinori Hirano, absent that day, also sent poems.
朝夕は暑さ和らぎ風涼し
今宵十五夜月は雲間に 光枝
The poet is 嘉山光枝. The poem has seasonal feeling and vividly brings its scene into view. The first half feels somewhat explanatory, but the bodily sensation of a cool breeze reaches the reader’s skin and refreshes us. In the second half, time shifts to night, with a full moon in the sky. We see it through clouds rather than directly. The intervening clouds create atmosphere and lingering resonance.
卒寿なる姉を施設に訪れて
春のうたなど次から次へ 由良子
The poet is 加藤由良子. Describing her elderly sister as 卒寿なる姉, a sister in her ninetieth year, expresses respect. The visit is to an institution rather than a home, yet the poet’s coming makes warmth stronger than loneliness. She spends time singing with her sister. The songs concern spring, a season symbolizing youth and renewal, and thus give a lighthearted, bright impression.
時越へてこの地愛した人偲ぶ
白秋の歌受け継がれゆく 喜子
A poem by 安田喜子. In October, Misaki offers a boat tour from the port along a “Hakushu Literary Course.” The poet joined it and wrote of her feelings. Hakushu Kitahara lived in Misaki for about ten months. He loved the place and left works connected with it, including “Jogashima no Ame.” Time, land, person, and poem overlap here. Though cultural inheritance is the theme, the work reaches beyond private feeling to carry this place’s literary memory into the future.
トランプも習近平（シージンピン）もプーチンも
民に向けたる眼差し冷たし 員子
A poem by 羽床員子, expressing a concise criticism of contemporary politics. By placing three political leaders of countries with different systems and cultures in parallel and judging all as looking coldly upon their people, it criticizes power itself beyond individuals. Repeating も three times in the first half improves the rhythm and strengthens the sense that they are all alike. Though the closing 冷たし is an emotional word, the ending restrains anger and sorrow. Interestingly, the poet looks coldly upon leaders who look coldly upon their people.
茹で栗を美味しと食べる病床の
父はリハビリ優等生 潤
The poet is Jun Hayama. This concerns a father in his sickbed, but neither grief nor encouragement is voiced. There is none of the sentimentality common in family poems; the poet simply observes. Quietly watching a forward-looking father conveys deep respect, accepting him as he is now. Instead of discussing illness, the poem attends to an everyday instant. The seasonal, domestic word 茹で栗, boiled chestnuts, enfolds weighty terms such as “sickbed” and “rehabilitation.” The familiar, humorous closing リハビリ優等生, a star pupil in rehabilitation, gives the affectionate gaze toward his efforts a warm resonance throughout. It remains in the heart.
津波警報「おばあちゃん大丈夫かな」と
幼子のことば嬉しき 和子
A poem by 清水和子. Placing “tsunami warning” first immediately creates tension and anxiety, which the following child’s words soften at once. Direct speech reaches the reader as a voice rather than an explanation. Whom does one think of first in a disaster? Frankly writing 嬉しき, gladness that the child thought of her, conveys personal joy and the passing of consideration across generations. The directness makes that concern more certain. The poem breaks the regular meter, effectively conveying both the disaster’s urgency and the child’s feeling for a grandmother as they are.
秋の空舞ひてさやかに黒揚羽
天より来る仮姿に見ゆ ユキノリ
The poet is Yukinori Hirano. The first half sketches a black swallowtail flying in the autumn sky. The second becomes somewhat symbolic or religious, leaving room to see the butterfly as something else. The words 天より来る and 仮姿 present it as a being provisionally manifest in this world, seemingly standing at the boundary between life and death. It is a poem of considerable depth.
吾の逝く生家の里の血脈に
トンボの群消え粉雪の舞ふ 成秋
A poem by President Seishu Hamano. Does 吾の逝く生家の里 mean the birthplace containing the grave he will enter after death? The second half’s description admits several readings. The reader sees two scenes, a flying swarm of dragonflies and dancing powder snow, switching abruptly from the first to the second. This suggests the rapid change from autumn to winter, or a once-living scene of dragonflies turned cold and desolate: the passage of time and change in nature. The vivid transition communicates the changing hometown as sensation rather than explanation.
ひとりごとつらつらつらと書き連ね
己を解して心和らぐ 弘子
The poet is 嶋田弘子. A poem of introspection, it captures the moment when diary writing leads to healing and self-understanding. Writing puts the heart in order. The light rhythm from つらつらつら and the repeated つら in 書き連ね is striking and may itself suggest the heart’s flow. Limiting the ending to the heart softening suggests that the poet’s problems remain unresolved. This restraint answers the light rhythm of the first half and naturally supports the movement from introspection to relief.
神無月刈り田の面（おも）に夕陽さし
ありし日しのぶ影ぞこひしき 裕二
My own poem. A late-autumn landscape overlaps memories of the past. The second half shifts the viewpoint from the external world inward. Consequently, “days gone by” and “shadows” are not limited to a particular object but connect with each reader’s memories. It offers considerable freedom of interpretation and leaves lingering emotion.
いつも買うコンビニコロッケ値上げされ
今日より十月値上げの十月 尚道
The poet is 三宅尚道. The age’s atmosphere is condensed into a rise in the price of a croquette. Repeating “October” emphasizes the reality that merely changing the date increases life’s burden. Attention to a tiny daily event quietly links individual life with social movement. Instead of loud criticism, an altered sense of unease awakens the reader’s sympathy.
Tanka’s orderly five-seven-five-seven-seven rhythm is pleasant, but sometimes cannot fully convey an unexpected event or abrupt change. At such times, broken meter deliberately disrupts the flow of words and brings reality’s speed and breathing into the poem. Shimizu uses it effectively here. The reader’s breathing is briefly disturbed, and that disturbance conveys actual anxiety and surprise as sensation. Broken meter is not a device merely to emphasize meaning; it is a way to express directly what one feels on encountering reality. Shimizu’s poem communicates this naturally. If I find a suitable subject, I too would like to attempt it.
Original wording, author credits, notes and source materials are preserved there.