Misuzu Kaneko was a Japanese children’s poet who lived from 1903-1930. If you do the math, you’ll see that she died young, and if you do a bit of internet research, you’ll discover her death was by suicide at the tender age of 26. I’ve read and written about Misuzu’s life and why I felt compelled to translate her work in the essay, Forgotten Woman, in the journal Electric Literature.
Recently, my co-translator and aunt, Michiko Tsuboi, have begun translating Misuzu’s poetry again. This time we are translating a series of poems Misuzu wrote about her hometown, Senzaki. This series is called “Senzaki Hakkei” and does in poetry what Hokusai and other artists from Japan do visually, for example, in Eight Views of Mount Fuji. The ‘hakkei’ tradition of viewing a place from various picturesque angles is an old one for visual artists in Japan, but not really done in poetry, so Misuzu’s innovation on what is mostly a visual technique is unique and not just because it represents in words a description of a location, but also because it meditates on the words about the place itself and what associations the name, for example, evokes in the poet’s heart.
Translation gives me a deeper reading of a place. The assignation of words to a place is the beginning of its intepretation of it. Take for example, the first poem we began translating — Hanazura. Hanazura is the literal name of the place in Senzaki, given to a rock formation in the sea with a gaping hole in the middle of it. When I used Google Translate on the actual Japanese text of the title, it simply reiterated the word as is in Roman letters. Hanazura is, after all, the literal name of the place. However, the romanized letters do not convey the same meaning as the kanji which appear like so: 花 (hana-flower) 津(zu-harbor) 浦 (ra-inlet). The kanji would seem to indicate the rather poetic image of a ‘flower harbor [on an] inlet’ — but the kanji is used homophonically only. The rock formation looks nothing like a ‘flower harbor [on an] inlet’ but rather looks like the nostril on a cow in which a nose-ring might appear. Or so went Michiko’s explanation of the rock formation’s appearance; she watched a Japanese video On The Eight Views of Senzaki -- Hanazura which she promptly sent me the link to.
It’s important to note here that the word ‘hana’ can mean in one kanji’s iteration 花 — ‘flower,’ but also in another kanji iteration 鼻 — ‘nose.’ So, although the kanji used in the name might imply one image, in fact, as a homophone, it suggests the other meaning.
In the poem, Misuzu makes no comment on the place’s name or the name’s origin. She instead remembers hearing the story of the name’s origin from a man at the post office, and also plays with the word ‘hana’s’ alternate meaning as ‘nose’ — something that is hard and practically impossible to translate. And then remarkably, she makes a leap to reflect on the nature of passing time. My aunt was astonished by the fact that a 26 year old woman who had all the future ahead of her would be so cognizant of time’s fleetingness. But, by the age of 26 for Misuzu, so much had already passed between the time of her innocent child-like hearing of an explanation of the place name’s origin to the present moment of her adult observation in the poem that it’s not impossible to imagine her thinking of her hometown sights in such a poignant manner.
My aunt is 76; I am turning 60 this year. Life long lovers of reading and literature, how could we not be captivated by this startlingly astute poet of Japan, Misuzu Kaneko? Her work continues to inspire and give us new interpretations and ways of seeing the world. Despite her short life and career, Misuzu Kaneko is a much celebrated and beloved poet in Senzaki for good reason.