Songs II
Sunless lake in the center of the head.
おれの詩
おれの頭の中にはいつも薄明い水たまりがある。
水たまりは滅多に動いたことはない。
おれの詩
おれの頭の中にはいつも薄明い水たまりがある。
水たまりは滅多に動いたことはない。
おれはいく日もいく日も薄明い水光りを眺めてゐる。
と、突然空中からまつさかさまに飛びこんで來る、目玉ばかり大きい靑蛙！
おれの詩はお前だ。
おれの詩はお前だ。
惡念
松葉牡丹をむしりつつ
ひと殺さむと思ひけり
光まばゆき昼なれど
女ゆゑにはすべもなやう
MY POETRY
Sunless lake in the center of the head.
On rare occasion there is motion.
Days elongate, I stare at the light
Figures in the sunless
Lake—
And then, unexpectedly, flying headfirst
From the sky,
The frogs with outsized eyes!
My poetry—is you.
My poetry—is you.
EVIL SPIRITS
To pluck a moss rose is
To kill a being:
The glow was dazzling, even
At noon, but because
Of the women
There was no way out.
Ryūnosuke Akutagawa (1892–1927), born in Tokyo, Japan, was the author of more than three-hundred fifty works of fiction and nonfiction. Japan’s premier literary award for emerging writers, the Akutagawa Prize, is named after him.