September
It’s cluster-amaryllis* season again.
No matter how unseasonable the weather
Like clock-work, at the time of the autumnal equinox
This flower blooms
To add its delicate shade of yellow
To the amber waves of ripening rice
In the drying paddies.
*In Japanese, the common name for this flower is ‘higan flower,’
because it blooms during the equinoctial (higan) week.
Red dragonflies flitting in the dusk
And morning and evening chill punctuated by chirping insects
Announce the arrival of autumn,
But through the day the sun beams down
To light up the dazzling, swaying pampas grass.
These signs of autumn bring to mind a nostalgic ditty learned as a child
When was it that my mother carried me on her back
To watch the red dragonflies flitting in the dusk?
Was that outing in the mountain field
Where we gathered mulberries in little baskets
Nothing but a dream?
Autumn grows deeper with each falling rain.
Why do I feel more and more lonely with every passing breeze?
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