From a Three-Cornered World. James Masao Mitsui

that has twisted away

      from doubt. Happy to be here

      still I have a place on that grey continent,

      far home of my grandfathers,

      those figures I never saw except in pictures.

      Photographs yellow and brown as old newsprint,

      smudges of thought, of fingers and skin.

      Time to realize the importance of rain.

      Rain on the ground,

      and rain still falling.

      II / from Crossing the Phantom River 1978

       Allowance

      I am ten.

      My mother sits in a black

      rocking chair in the parlor

      and tells stories of a country school

      surrounded by ricefields

      and no roads.

      I stand in the kerosene light