English Original
fallen into sleep
as if drawn to the bottom
of the water
I store one night's worth
of death within me
Gusts, 20, Fall/Winter 2014
Aya Yuhki
Chinese Translation (Traditional)
沉睡了
彷彿被拉到河水
的底層
我的內心深處存有
一晚的死亡
Chinese Translation (Simplified)
沉睡了
仿佛被拉到河水
的底层
我的内心深处存有
一晚的死亡
Bio Sketch
Aya Yuhki was born and now lives in Tokyo. She started writing tanka more than thirty years ago and has expanded her interests to include free verse poetry, essay writing, and literary criticism. Aya Yuhki is Editor-in-Chief of The Tanka Journal published by the Japan Poets’ Society. Her works are featured on the homepage of the Japan Pen Club’s Electronic Library.
Aya's tanka effectively builds, line by line, to an unexpected yet thematically significant and emotionally poignant ending that reveals the theme of sleep as (drowning) death.
ReplyDeleteHer thought-provoking tanka reminds me of the following two remarks on the relationship between sleep and death:
Sleep is a shallow death we practice every night.
-- Lydia Netzer
Can death be sleep, when life is but a dream,
And scenes of bliss pass as a phantom by?
-- John Keats
And it might interesting to do a comparative thematic reading of the following tanka:
a dead brown seed
becoming in a muddy pot
a white flower
it is a lie you know
about death, I mean
A Gift of Tanka, 1990
Jane Reichhold