Culture Reflections

Terayama’s Mama

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Two  maternally-themed tanka poems, written by Shuji Terayama in  the early 1960s:

 

fixed

in the cold sight of my gun

the sparrow on the roof

might be my mother

 

さむきわが射程のなかにさだまりし

屋根の雀は母かもしれぬ

 

carpenter town

temple town rice town

Buddha town

tell me, swallow

is there a town for buying old mothers

 

大工町寺町米町仏町

老母買ふ町あらずやつばめよ