238.
The fanfare of lovers’ cheers
And mothers’ fears
Silenced by their dreams
Which form a ballast
Which burst the barometers glass,
The weight of sleep, the dreams
Of barnacles and molluscs.
I think about all the homecomings
That did not happen, all the embraces
Of grateful sisters, and the fathers who
Were the commissioners of fossils
On that silvery coast;
It aggrieves in midwinter,
It shimmers in summer.
A gift unopened, a present,
A necklace of serpentine
Now tungsten. All the folklore
Unexplored, all these semi-precious
Memories which into blue dungeons
Silt and deposit.
The flags are furled with care,
The lid is closed on the casket.
It takes its own unending tangent, the coast,
The perpetual waves with their own summits.
Seven Hundred Jisei 