Jubilee at the Japanese Garden

Shishi Odoshi / Rocking Fountain

In Our Long Life Together

It Is A Short Time

AT THE JAPANESE GARDENS

WITH KAREN ON OUR GOLDEN JUBILEE

In our long life together

it is a short time.

There are benches

in the garden, but there are no benches

by the rocking fountain,

Shishi Odoshi, but if you follow

the path around and above,

you can find a place to sit

and still hear the bamboo

hit the stone after it empties.

Shishi Odoshi at one time

scared away deer and wild boar.

That would give lovers a chance

to sit without fear. Bamboo

fills and empties every 12 seconds.

In my poem I’m trying to explore

time with my beloved. I’ve been

reading the love poem of Rabindranath Tagore

everyday, Gitanjali. Perhaps

you have heard of it. I was given

a very old copy from a man

from Bengal, his childhood book.

In our long life together a short time.

Words catch me by surprise.

What are your thoughts, Karen,

on water fountains? Rabindranath

would call you, Beloved,

using formal words, Thy and Thou.

What is a fountain for? And who?

These lines. What does it say?

Bells, fog. I want to hear, but I’m not

asking you to say a thing. Not really.

I’m sorry you’re here before they light the trees.

You wanted to see the lights

and I want to be here now, alone.

For me this is perfect, just us.

There are no busses here. No people.

We will have two hours to ourselves.

What experiences we bring.

They won’t all surface now from water.

But the pictures of our lives

will keep arriving.

Will this music help us to see,

or help us to remember?

What must happen for marriage to thrive?

Will song offerings be enough? Or needed?

You are the sounds of water song.

Your quietness is a sewn quilt .

Quietness of Karen.

Filling every 12 seconds.

Our long life together not very long at all.

Did marriage scare you, Karen?

Don’t be cowed by the fountain.

The jarring of the bamboo on stone.

Is this my voice entering your world?

How does the lover enter? And the old man?

How can a man enter the room as a song?

If this sound would scare a deer, what about the beloved?

What about all this quiet?

How does one sit in time?

Does it intimidate, cow, or scare the husband?

What does the man want from the woman?

Tell me about the time you were hypnotized.

Do you enjoy these steps, this path?

So many questions remain.

Is sitting an achievement?

Do you have hopes for yourself?

Harmony doesn’t mean sameness.

You created that landscape for me in marriage.

A stone cairn bringing us home.

You are beauty surrounding the beauty

you brought into my life. Here

with nothing to do. Or say,

if I could be quiet. Time is short.

This repeating fountain is a temporary machine.

Your love bests time testing mine.                       

Look around. I’m staying put.

I’ll be right here until the bus leaves.

Jim Bodeen 

7 December 2018