Shiki's Journey

“today’s so warm

   I should clean your room?”

      “aye, OK Mum”

she lays a bed out

   in the living room

      “through you go son”

on all fours

   those few yards

      are 5,000 miles

my left leg’s limp

   from pain

      so I put a foot-

pillow under

   my knee and drag

      my body bit-

by bit over

   the dangerous floor

      without any trouble

let myself down

   on the futon

      feet to the sliding

door and garden

   head pillowed north

      now Mum’s in

a dwam standing

   broom in hand

      mumbling “is

that the crowd

   I hear at the 

      athletics in Ueno?”

Alec Finlay

This poem is after Shiki, My Illness, from an original translation by Masako Hira. His prose was an affecting account of the difficult journey, from one room to another, contrasting his own pain with his mother's dreamy mood. Shiki is speaking to use from the Land of Counterpane.

These posts are published as part of a year-long artist in residence, funded by Paths for All.