Variations on Absence, i.
by Kimiko Hahn
In the story of Kuzu no Ha, (“Arrow Root Leaf” or “Kudzu Leaf”), a nobleman saves a white fox from a hunter. In gratitude, she reappears in the form of a woman and tends to the wounds he sustained. They marry and have a son but she must continue to hide her true nature. So, when her son spies the tip of her tail, she is fated to transform back into a fox. Before leaving, she writes a poem with the hope of seeing them one last time and bestowing upon her son the gift of speaking the language of animals—
koishiku ba / tazunekite miyo / izumi naru / shinoda no mori no / urami kuzunoha
—Variations—
[dearest husband,] if you love me, come find me in Shinoda Forest of Izumi within the stirring arrowroot
if you love me, come find me in Shinoda Forest among the bitter arrowroot
if you love me, come to Izumi, find me in Shinoda Forest among the bitter/resentful/aggrieved kudzu
if you love me, come find me in Shinoda Forest among the aggrieved tangle of kudzu
if you love me, come find me in Shinoda Forest among the twisted kudzu
if you love me, come find me in Shinoda Forest among the twisted, bitter kudzu
if you love me, come find me in Shinoda Forest among the disquieted arrowroot
come find me in Shinoda Forest among the disquieted arrowroot, if you love me
[Note: looking up urami, I see that in folklore there is a sense of haunting.]
if you love me, come find me in Shinoda Forest among the mournful arrowroot
if you love me, come find me in Shinoda Forest among the dispirited arrowroot
if you love me, find me in Shinoda Forest among the dispirited arrowroot
find me in Shinoda Forest among the dispirited arrowroot, if you love me
if you love me, come find me in Shinoda Forest’s dispirited arrowroot
if you love me, come to Shinoda Forest and find me in the dispirited kudzu
[Note: I think to look up “kudzu and symbolism in Japanese mythology” and find seasonal change, tenacious life, profound longing.]
if you love me, come to Shinoda Woods and find me in the dispirited leaves for which I was named
[No other author is given. Translation is almost too much to bear. ]
Photo Credit: Beowulf Sheehan
Kimiko Hahn is the author of eleven collections, most recently The Ghost Forest: new and selected poems. Her subjects range from identity to current events to science. In the new work, she continues to play with Eastern, Western and hybrid forms–and she invents new forms that pay homage to past writers. Among her honors is the 2023 Ruth Lilly Prize for Lifetime Achievement from The Poetry Foundation and she is a Chancellor at the Academy of American Poets. Hahn teaches in the MFA Program for Creative Writing and Literary Translation at Queens College, City University of New York.