Pathway to Japanese Literature

In the autumn eighteen years ago, while sequestered alone on that island, I received unexpected news that my younger sister—who had settled in Kyushu—lay critically ill. Tears rose to my eyes, yet I made no move to leave the island. Such was my state of mind at the time.

However, my sister’s condition improved somewhat after that, and though she remained bedridden, she held on until the following summer.
The short piece displayed on the left is something I wrote—likely shortly after her death—drawing upon still-vivid memories and bedside notes from her lifetime, composed as a keepsake of remembrance during that summer when I visited her at her marital home after hearing she longed to see me and all hope had finally been lost.

When I arrived and saw her, my sister had grown emaciated beyond recognition.
I thought she would be greatly surprised since I hadn’t given prior notice, but where one ought to show shock or joy, her extreme weakness left her unable to manifest even visible excitement—this sort of involuntary impassivity being something I would later intimately experience myself when ill and enfeebled—and she simply lay awake nearly the entire night.
My sister’s face had transformed due to emaciation.
Her eyes, which had been somewhat narrow, became wide and clear with a sharp elongation; her once demure, small mouth was now firmly set in a straight line, and when she smiled, a deep vertical dimple formed at the corner of her lips.
On her pallid, fragile skin, the eyebrows that had once been the most beautiful feature of her face—those softly arched brows—now seemed darker and more pronounced than before.
There was nothing particularly striking about any single feature, yet her entire face—ordinarily pleasant in every aspect—possessed a sculptural beauty imbued with an artistic craftsmanship in the best sense.
—Later, I unexpectedly found that likeness in the Noh mask Shojuro.
My sister had also liked Noh.
Therefore, whenever she did something arduous or unpleasant for me, I would say, "This is your reward," and often take her to Noh performances.
It was for such reasons that I once considered giving this short piece the title Shojuro—after my sister and I unexpectedly met each other’s gaze for the first time in ages, some time passed before she

“Mr. □□, you’ve gotten quite plump, haven’t you?”

she said.
This might have been her first words.
She had grown too weak to manage even greetings.

When I arrived wondering what kind of place it might be, I found my sister living in a gloomy house perched alone behind earthen walls.
In front of the sickroom, four or five hinoki cypress trees stood in a plot of two or three tsubo, while parched tsunbo grass grew brittle in the gaps between roof tiles atop the earthen wall.
Occasionally, pale crabs would crawl slowly by, their eyes twitching.
As evening approached, countless spiders busily spun their webs from branch to branch of the hinoki trees and from the eaves to the roof tiles.
Geckos appeared.
My sister, who had always detested such creatures, lay with her head pressed tightly against the pillow, watching them calmly as though they were invisible.
On the opposite side across slightly wider ground, shapeless trees stood scattered, among them a small tree bearing red fruit.
Still, countless spiders spun their webs.
The wings of spirit dragonflies crept along the eaves, glittering.
My sister—

“When I heard about that island, I cried.”

she said.
It was only after her initial critical condition, when her health had temporarily improved considerably, that she was first told of my seclusion on the island.
As though she had to desperately muster what little strength remained even for these brief utterances, and as though she sought to pluck the single most vital thread from many words to avoid waste, she would speak—punctuated by long intervals—in a voice as faint as a mosquito’s hum.

My sister had a daughter.
She was just one year old and crawled about.
Having been confined to bed since slightly before giving birth, she had never once held the child.
There were times when she would watch the crawling infant—keeping her head motionless, following it only within her eyes' limited range of movement.
The child was doted on intensely by the Kamaya Couple across the way, who would typically take her from morning and let her play all day long.
Because it was a narrow lane without passersby, voices of frolicking children could often be heard.
They seemed like good people.

There was a day when black bees came to take spiders, skillfully plucking them from their webs.
There was an evening when bats fluttered about.
Days of rain, days of thunder.

When I went to wash my face at the wellside, there stood a large pomelo tree heavy with green fruits.
In the cool shade of the tree, a pair of robust golden-feathered chickens always stood aligned as if guarding their own territory—but when people approached, the male would rattle his throat and stride off with great steps, his feathered legs swinging boldly.
After my sister had settled into married life and visited the capital for the first time, she would talk and laugh about how customs there had changed—saying that during Bon festivals and year-end, she would distribute one pomelo from our house to each acquaintance—and this was what she had meant.

One day, my sister—

“Mr. □□, I’m sure you’d love that sort of place—you should go see it. There’s a single narrow room right by the back moat,” she said.

It had originally been a storage room where tatami mats were laid down, so even now it remained a storage room—but among all the packed items, there was just barely enough space for two people to lie down. Because it stood completely apart from the main house, directly bordering the old castle moat, it was both profoundly quiet and truly unusual. The water stretched about a hundred meters wide. Beyond the expanse of lotuses, water mallow and cattails grew in tangled profusion with duckweed spread like a carpet over the surface. On windy days, after being blown ashore, the water would recede to reveal crucian carp lining up their snouts. The white lotus flowers blooming in profusion made a magnificent sight. The buds were tinged faintly red at the tips. Leaves shaped like upturned samurai hats swayed gently, struggling to hold the midsummer sunlight. The curled leaves were also beautiful. Rainy days were even better—the rain fell without pause while people in straw raincoats and hats passed by. There were also many carp, soft-shelled turtles, and eels. It was said that long ago, waterfowl like coots and cranes would gather here unafraid of people. I took a liking to this intriguing detached room and began visiting frequently, lingering there for hours on end.

My sister dozed during the day but grew alert at night, unable to sleep.
While everyone else slept soundly, she lay awake alone, tormented by loneliness; and as her body ailed her, she would rouse others and fret.
I too was sleeping nearby, yet I alone made no attempt to rouse her.
This was because, no matter what I might have felt in my heart, I had never once lifted a finger to do anything for her, nor had I any inclination to do so—a tendency that would later change drastically for various reasons—and while I remained untroubled by this, my sister for her part did not seem particularly dissatisfied either.—What she sought from me, and what she received, was this chest.
It was not a hand—whenever my sister grew too agitated or writhed in the night, I would wake and laugh alone.
When in pain, my sister would plead using these words: "It’s too much, too much."
She must have grown accustomed to using them over time, merely wanting others to understand her pain.

My sister was so debilitated that unless she had some practical matter to discuss or was in an exceptionally good mood, she wouldn’t even speak to me sitting beside her.
She, one time—

“I’m happy because whenever I start vomiting, Mr. XX comes right away…”

—she said this partly as if thanking me, partly as if informing Mr. XX—her husband—.
Because my sister could eat nothing at all—even the scant meal she managed to force down would come back up—I would check whenever she vomited to see whether everything had come out or if something remained.
Also, when Mr. XX was away and I was working in another room,

“I’m sorry, but I’m lonely—please come here.”

she said.

I brought "The Silver Spoon" manuscript and sat by her bedside to work.
My sister would stare intently at my face and doze off peacefully.
It was said that during her long illness, the only people she had expressed wanting to see were Mother and me.
And so...

"I wonder if I'll die within two or three days like this."
"But since I've already met everyone I wanted to see, it's fine."

She said such things too.
At times she would say she wanted to get well soon, or when the suffering grew too much, that she'd be better off dead.

“The house is spinning.”
“I feel light-headed—can’t tell if my body even exists anymore.”

It was during such moments that my sister hated it most.
Her head grew foggy—she could grasp nothing of past or present or future, nothing of herself or where she lay or why she lay there—until even events from moments prior receded like distant dreams, leaving her aware only of this vast incomprehension.
She writhed and cried in desperation, frantic to comprehend quickly, to escape this half-alive state.
But to me, who had never experienced such a thing, this distress—which seemed more mental than physical—remained beyond full comprehension.

On a day when her mood was relatively good, when she and I were alone together, my sister told me this story.
That was last year.
It was the first time it had snowed since she had come here.
Having not seen snow in so long, even while bedridden, I was so thrilled—so thrilled—and craved to eat it—craved it so desperately that I finally pleaded, despite expecting a scolding, for them to bring me some that had piled on pine needles, and I ate it.
As she told this story, my sister’s face brightened with childlike eagerness, as if even the memory itself brought her joy.
She said, "But it melted right away."

Because the illness dragged on so long, my sister herself came to consider hospitalization, and with everyone urging her too, it was finally decided. As she left the house,

“I wonder if I’ll be able to walk to the entrance when I’m discharged this time.”

she mused.
Having heard from Mr. XX that she would die soon—being the only one who knew—I found it painful to be told such things.
I accompanied her to the sickroom.
When leaving, my sister—

“Please come every day.”

she said.

I went to the hospital every day and sat by the bedside without doing anything.
During those hours, whenever a thought occurred to her, she would exchange a word or two.
It seemed the exertion from her hospital admission had taken its toll, for her condition worsened further, and her mind grew foggy nearly every day, leaving her anxious.
My sister could no longer grasp even her own position, nor whether bedding or a sickbed existed at all.
And even during meals, if the dishes were not placed before her in their usual arrangement at her customary position, she would stare at them, unable to comprehend how to take up her chopsticks.
Given this state of things, she felt all the more lonely, and when I went to her,

“I’m lonely… come closer and hold my hand, please.”

This kind of thing happened often.
At such times, I would spend the day holding her hand and gazing at her face.
...My sister—

“My stomach must be in terrible shape.”

she said.
Without knowing she had grown so weak she would soon die, she developed severe emaciation around her chest and countless subcutaneous hemorrhages—unpleasant signs of impure blood.

It happened about two days before her death. … She had asked me to come immediately, but when I went, there was no one there—she lay utterly alone.

“What’s wrong?”

When I said this and approached,

“I’m lonely… hold my hand.”

With that, she extended her hand.
Was it the day before? She had been overjoyed, saying that for the first time since being hospitalized her mind was clear and she could understand everything perfectly, but on this day too, claiming to feel well, she spoke more than ever before.
She laughed at herself, remarking how strange it was that when dazed she wished to die yet when lucid still longed to recover.
My sister… let slip her grievances.
Then when she said, “Lift me up a little more,” I carefully cradled her to shift her toward the displaced pillow, but the slight jostling from this motion made her once-clear head grow clouded again.
Yet she showed a faint smile, her expression mingling gratitude and awkwardness at receiving such care from me for the first time.
That remained the sole instance before or after when I personally attended to her.
Beside her pillow sat a potted Western daffodil received as a get-well gift, but my sister who had once adored flowers no longer bothered to look its way.
To the print I’d bought and hung on the wall she merely offered a perfunctory “How pretty” and nothing more.
Outside the window stood young poplars and oleanders where several pigeons often pecked for food.
They must have come from Tenjin-sama.

It was indeed the morning two days after this happened.
When an urgent summons came from the hospital, I went immediately.
Mr. XX was away, having crossed the strait for a house call.
She usually hated being left behind and would try to stop them, but that day she had consented, saying she felt well enough.
And only the attendants were present.
Sister’s lips had lost all color.
She looked at my and Mother’s faces.

“It’s painful...
“Close my lips.”

she said in a faint, insect-like voice.
They said that after she sat up, she collapsed face down while sitting there, her pulse having grown dangerously weak, and they finally managed to save her with an injection.
I thought, The time I anticipated has come.
When my sister briefly regained her vigor from the injection, she—

“I won’t eat today,”
she said.
She was always scolded and forced to eat.
The in-laws and the Kamaya couple had come.
The nurse brought the child holding her.
Sister calmly looked around at the tearful, flustered people.
And to the nurse standing behind her back holding the child—

“If you don’t come here, she can’t see,”

she said.
Kamaya’s wife took the child from the nurse’s hands to show her.
Sister maintained her calm expression after just one glance.
When her suffering intensified, she would say things that seemed like delirious ramblings—yet they were never truly delirious.
Even with her eyes closed unnoticed, she could clearly discern whether the doctor was present.

“My head is so clear, yet I understand nothing anymore...”
she said.
She called out pleadingly to her mother-in-law
“Mother… it’s painful.”
she said.
Sister had been relying deeply on her mother-in-law.
Mother was shedding tears.

“Oh… oh… you’ll find peace soon…” With that, she rubbed her back. With her eyes still closed—as if desperately willing everyone to quickly comprehend and somehow resolve her agonizing, helpless, bizarre distress—she strained her voice through the pain and repeated these words again and again: “No matter how much I try to breathe, I just can’t anymore. What should I do? Look… no matter how much I try…”

Even as she spoke, her breath kept catching time and again; she would strain with all her might to draw air in, but—

“Won’t someone please teach me? I just can’t breathe anymore.”

In the end, as if possessed,

“Won’t someone please give me breath?”

she said.
Again,

“Because whenever I say something, I immediately forget—I keep ice in my mouth constantly. Only then can I understand.”

she also said.
As always, there was nothing like situations like these to lay bare our helplessness.
We surrounded the patient being cooked to Death’s liking and stood by utterly at a loss.
I looked around at myself and the others and nearly burst out laughing.
I stood up, went to the window, and looked outside.
Just as the evening shower had passed, clumps of clouds drifted lightly away.
Eventually, the day grew hot, and the strong wind subsided.

Even after they repeatedly revived her with injections each time her breath nearly stopped like that, by around three o'clock, Mr. XX still hadn't returned.
In the end, people stood at intervals along the corridor—so long it felt interminable, stretching from the hospital entrance to the sickroom—so that the moment Mr. XX's figure was spotted, they could alert the room as quickly as possible.
Finally, Mr. XX managed to return there.
I felt relieved.
Now there was nothing left but for her to die.

When Mr. XX returned, his eyes were not red.
Mr. XX took the hand.
“Do you understand?”
When he said this, she nodded.
“I can tell by your voice.”

she said.

Someone was crying—she suddenly opened her eyes wide while they were administering injections. And she smiled while looking around at everyone’s faces.

“I can understand again now.”

she said.
From that moment on, Sister no longer felt any physical pain.
—I now wonder if they hadn’t given her a morphine injection—her face also began showing signs of subcutaneous hemorrhaging.
And with Mr. XX taking her hand, she answered whatever he asked in her usual manner when free from pain.
However, it appeared she herself had noticed that periods of clear consciousness and unclear consciousness alternated with an extremely slow rhythm.
During those periods of unclear consciousness, her pulse and breathing would show abnormalities.
The cycle of light and dark gradually quickened, drawing her step by step closer to the end.
I, too, tried taking her hand for a moment, but unbeknownst to me, the tips had already turned pale and cold.
At last, while Sister was mid-sentence—Ah... ah... aah— she drew a sharp breath, her breathing ceasing for five or six seconds. Yet as we watched, she abruptly opened her eyes like one awakening from a trance, released a sighing Aah—, drew another breath, and smiled at us with such radiant joy.

“What’s wrong? Are you happy?”

When Mr. XX said this, she nodded lightly.

“I’m starting to understand again.”

she said.
I felt a strange sensation because what I had believed to be her final death had been reversed.
Sister gazed blankly around at Mother, who was crying, and everyone’s faces.
While talking with Mr. XX, her gaze would occasionally fix on me.
The color of her eyes began to fade.
I wondered if she could still see me and moved a bit closer.

“Can you see?”

When I said this, she smiled faintly and nodded slightly.
Wanting to closely observe this indescribably quiet, mysterious state, I propped myself on one elbow by the bed and meticulously observed her weakening by the moment, jotting down key points in my notebook.
Sister, while talking with Mr. XX who was constantly checking her pulse, eventually—

“This might be the last time I can talk with you—I’ll lose understanding again any moment now, you see.
“Look…”

Having said that, she abruptly stopped breathing and closed her eyes.
Mr. XX was waiting and administered an injection.
Not a single person uttered a word.
It was quiet.
There were only Mr. XX, myself, and two mothers there—no one else.
When we stared at her closed face and waited, she eventually began breathing again.
As it had finally become impossible to sustain her any longer, Mr. XX—
“Do you have any last words to leave behind?”

When he said this, she smiled faintly and nodded slightly.
Perhaps dying had become nothing to her by then.
Perhaps she had wanted to die, as people often say.
Mr. XX pressed his face to the floor and wept uncontrollably——Sister’s pupils had dilated until they seemed to see nothing, yet those eyes finally closed.
Even so, as if trying to speak, she moved her lips and made a fumbling gesture before her face.
But she soon drew her last breath.
A final breath always appears final however many times one sees it—to outside eyes, unbearably poignant.
Everyone gathered around and cried.
Was this my customary way in such situations?
In accordance with that habit, I did not shed a single tear.
Then I watered the Western flowering crabapple left parched from being forgotten in her death.
Pigeons came scavenging as always.
It was a clear, hot evening.
The famous evening calm had set in—poplars and oleanders stood motionless like carved ornaments.

They carried the corpse into the house and laid it in the tatami room.
Whenever this happened, I would be overcome by an uncanny sensation.
Looking at this thing lying there like a ceramic doll, I thought—what on earth was this?
Mr. Kamaya brought the child along.

“Look here. Mother has become Nammami-sama,” he said.
The child gazed blankly.

Everyone was absorbed in their own tasks, so the corpse was left in front of the bed.
And remembering how she had called out to me when she felt lonely, I sat by her side.

The next day, they placed the corpse in the coffin.
In accordance with local custom, they all wrote *Namu Amida Butsu* on paper and placed it inside.
Mr. Kamaya

“Allow me to add mine as well.”

Saying this, he wrote and placed it inside. Only family members cut the nails from her hands and feet, wrapped them in paper, and placed them inside. For someone like me who habitually bit my nails out of nervousness, there were no nails left to trim. So I scraped off what little I could as a token offering. When I glanced at the pale, rigid corpse with hands clasped in prayer inside the cramped coffin, it still somehow felt like my sister. This hand was undoubtedly the same one she had extended to me just yesterday, saying "I'm lonely."

At night, we went to the crematorium.

Early the next morning, we went with Mr. XX to collect the bones in an urn.
The crematorium worker broke apart the clay sealing the furnace door, scattering it away, and opened the iron door.
On the iron plate, shattered bones mingled with ashes were scraped out using a long-handled broom-like tool and sorted through.
The crematorium worker went around to the rear opening of the furnace.

“This much fell over here, you see.”

and brought back two or three pieces that had separated from the sutures of the skull.
We sifted through the ashes—this was a rib, this a vertebra, a femur—handling each bone one by one before placing them in the urn.
The large ones clattered, the small ones tinkled.
Among the bones, the crematorium worker noticed some that had blackened.

“When there’s fat or such, it inevitably turns out like this.”

Saying this, he picked them out to show.
Nearby, the crematorium worker began sifting bone powder, causing ash clouds to billow up thickly.
We stepped outside for a while.

Out at sea—the crematorium was on the coast—islands such as Genkaishima, Nokono Island, and Shikanoshima were visible. Offshore, there was a long, narrow sandbar extending far out called Umino-Nakamichi. My sister, who loved boats, had wanted to go there—they were supposed to take her someday, or so it was said. From within the sifted remains they picked out several more teeth. Because the urn was too small to contain them all, the crematorium worker pressed down from above and damaged the bones, so they exchanged it for a larger one.

The next morning, when I looked closely at the tree with red berries in the garden where a cicada's exuviae clung, a freshly molted minmin cicada rested motionless beside it. Everywhere still glistened with freshness in pale hues, its wings like frameworks of white coral and jade spread with crystal, now damp with dew.
……

Night.

The funeral.

The temple cemetery was vast, with five or six massive ginkgo trees shaped like large bird feathers standing jet-black in a row.
My sister's grave was erected between hazel trees bearing fruit.

Sister was twenty-three.
Her image remained as vivid as yesterday throughout those seventeen long years, while I grew older only to become younger and more childlike in that unchanging memory.
While conjuring up that image in my mind, I took up my pen.
And countless times before finishing this vignette, I had to set down my pen and restrain tears that threatened to overflow.
Only now did I realize how deeply I had loved her.

Meiji 45 Summer

Showa 3