- Nojuku, and: On the Outskirts of Matsumae
Nojuku
When the tail end of a monsoon marooned me for a week in a free campground near Hakodate Bay in north Japan I met Hiroto
who at twenty wanted only to walk the four-hundred-mile length of Hokkaido if for no other reason than to get somewhere
and who before long explained to mein gestures the idea of nojuku
which I eventually understood to mean the art of traveling on dollars a day sleeping in parks and fields and eating onigiri rice balls from 7-Elevens
while always budgeting enough cash to bathe in a hot spring when you really needed it
and since he invited me to come along as far as I would we each piled a sleeping bag a tent and a change of clothes on our back the next clear day [End Page 220]
and looking like fast-stepping turtles set out toward the north shore town of Wakkanai from which you can see Russia if it's not cloudy
and it was while walking along narrow roads through rice fields and dragonflies by the Sea of Japan that first week
with nothing to do all day but mix his pidgin English with my pidgin Japanese and try with more laughter than success
to decipherwhat the other really meant to say that I began to understand how little the lack of a common language matters
to peoplewho are headed in the same direction and who sweat under the same sun
and so of course I tried to say as much and I suspect Hiroto did the same. [End Page 221]
On the Outskirts of Matsumae
Who cares if all the details and dreams add up to dust
and planspan out to nothing but a pair of open hands held heavenward
as longas there's still wind in hair and falling leaves
and grace can still become as simple as an apple from a lady stooped with age
who pities youbecause she sees you're out of place [End Page 222]
freeman rogers is a South Carolina native who works as the editor of The BVI Beacon newspaper in the British Virgin Islands. His poetry and other writing have appeared in Slate, Shenandoah, and Oxford American. He is an associate editor of Smartish Pace and a fiction editor of Moko.