Florian crouches beside the stone, gently running fingers along the surface of the plaque. And he realises the judges knew they need not bother, for Terasaka is left to wander the land; an exile, a community of one, cursed to live and be free.
In front of the grave, Florian slowly stands and nods.
The two old men depart. A young salary-man crouches to place a stick of incense at each grave. A small group of middle-aged women croon together, moving through the gates and collecting the offerings they will give, pausing by rough stone lanterns and elaborate shrines.
A depression in one of the lanterns marks where incense sticks have been piled -- three-hundred years of homage has burned the rock away.
~
Hiroko and Florian turn off the moat-side path away from the rail tracks to face Yaskuni, where the souls of Japanese soldiers rest.
Florian rallies what energy he has left from his encounter with Sengaku-ji.
A museum is located within the shrine grounds -- its foyer hosts a clean and well-preserved cannon, airplane, and train engine. An escalator ascends to a floor containing a manually guided torpedo. In the main exhibition room, for three-hundred yen, he reads through a narrative of the Russian-Japanese war.
Outside, Florian stands facing the glare of orange halogen, soaking their obscure warmth.
Senior salary-men lounge at an open-air cafeteria in the shrine courtyard. Beneath a lush canopy, the war shrine is dark.
He joins Hiroko -- arms crossed -- at the entrance of a sealed hall.
"What do you think?" she asks him.
"I think a lot of bad shit happened back then." He allows himself a sad, ironic grin. "Lucky you found pacifism."
They walk beneath steel torii and cross the road to the beginnings of a long promenade.
"Japan has renounced war," she agrees. "Perhaps it is yet to renounce dogma."
They walk beneath two giant bronze gates with high-school girls dressed in navy uniforms. The first Post-Meiji Restoration Minister of War stands upon his pedestal.
"But we live with our Pearl Harbors and our Hiroshimas," he insists. "We hold our Nuremberg trials. We move on." He wrestles with his native tongue. "We -- we get over it."
A group of co-eds walks parallel to Hiroko and Florian.
"Moving on together is good," Hiroko agrees, nodding earnestly. "Building a bridge, as you say, from the past to the present -- you need to start from both sides at the same time. My children -- they go to visit the Hiroshima Peace Memorial many times. It is important they know why it happened -- the truth." A couple of the boys hide behind a van. As the girls pass, the young boys stand and pounce, causing the girls to shriek and run off. "You see? You should never walk ahead without knowing what's behind you."
'Hanabi': towers of light, miniature supernovas, or literally 'Fire Flowers'. Sizzling bubbles spring upwards before bursting, silent but for their percussion thunder, modest and sublime in their simplicity. Florian and Hiroko mix with the cinders, smog, and the sweat. They pass a parked, unlit car, cigarette-bearing hand draped over the opened window as its owner gazes out. Meteoritic powder descends in simmering arcs.
Hiroko's hands brush against Florian's. Night has come quickly to Tokyo.
The air speaks of sulfur. Girls in tiny traditional garments dance on the street; old men holding opened Asahi cans ride bikes while families circle blankets.
Beside a hip-hop dance performance, Florian knows his ears will ring in the morning, but does not care. The aromatic combination of spirits and fruit juice tempts them to a street-side store lined with bottles and huge plastic cups, reminding Florian of an improvised frat-house bar. Eight-hundred yen provides Long Island Ice Teas freshly made in a blender; for five-hundred yen -- baked potatoes hidden beneath a mound of topping. They walk; one hand chilled by drink, the other warmed by polystyrene bowl.
A gang of off-duty labourers slides past in single file, their point man pinching grilled squid with chopsticks above a thin plastic tray, up to his mouth.
They attack their potatoes at the edge of a flower-bed. Hot melted cheese is extinguished by sour cream and washed down with frigid Long Islands. A toddler studies Florian, her arms slung around her father's neck, potato remnants smeared around her mouth, and free hand wielding a pair of chopsticks. He tries disarming her with a smile -- she glares back. Sugary bacon wages war against squid balls and chunky pancakes, while down the curb, a young couple inhales ramen.
A giant dance circuit made up of hundreds in the park's centre performs pop-Tai chi. Florian watches, entranced, as they move to a beat encouraged by sweet vocals and giant drums pummelled by percussionists, surrounded by a typhoon of colour, who twirl drumsticks between pelts of taut skins, dresses spinning. The dancers are a living embodiment of the Japanese concept of wa or 'balance', loosely translating into 'Don't blow it.' Each time the track ends the entourage -- a mixture of dedicated and amateur, kimono-clad and casual-dressed, centenarians to pre-schoolers -- oscillates as the song starts once more. It is a cross between the Hare Krishnas on the move and an Easter egg hunt.
~
The typhoon season has begun.
Florian and Hiroko lean against a bike rail in front of a convenience store.
Rain descends around them. Recently purchased towels encircle Florian's neck and run beneath his shirt, soaking up the rain, and a newly bought five-hundred yen umbrella-for-two hangs from the railing.
They stare at each other. She hands him the ramen bowl.
"Better?" she asks. He shrugs.
"It'll take more than ramen to warm me."
"You don't look like to feel cold." He takes her hand and places it on his chest, beneath his shirt. She withdraws with quiet amazement. "It will take a blow torch to cut through that ice."
"Interested in wielding it?" he asks. She nods seriously. He thinks about that one for a while and then brings his hands together sharply. Hiroko watches, wide eyed. "That's it. I need another drink."
He takes a miniature Baileys from the store's fridge and the attendant frowns as Florian trades it for a five-hundred yen coin.
Under Hiroko's gaze, he twists the bottle open. He takes his first swig in months and makes sure it is safe before turning to her. "Back in Melbourne I did something I was not proud of after drinking Baileys." And he raises the bottle. "I haven't been able to touch the stuff since."
"So rather than swallowing your pride you are swallowing your shame?"
Florian nods. "What can I say? I enjoy a good dollop of hubris even with humble pie. I'm-- " and with a lop-sided grin forms an arc with his spare hand. Hiroko copies him, and he shows her in slow motion until she has it right.
"What are we doing?"
"We're building a bridge."
He empties the bottle and tosses it into a recycle bin.
'Ready?' her expression asks.
Florian takes the umbrella in hand, and feels its bunched tip; he grimaces, but nods. Stepping out, he stares vertically at the neon-lit rain before unfurling their umbrella.
Hiroko steps up beside him, and takes his offered arm.
~
An upside moon lurks behind thinning cloud.
At the dogleg near Florian's apartment the night stinks of leek. In a spare block, stems poke through a white plastic streaked with the reflection of distant lights. Behind the garden a tall brown building gazes down at them with the gentle orange eyes of veiled balcony windows.
Lights dance along the road as a cyclist -- cell phone pressed to an ear -- swings past them.
The sky is a collection of dark blues, the horizon a satellite image of Earth's shadowy side, and Roppongi a nervous horse.
Hiroko leads the way up the stairs, through the lobby, and to his apartment.
~
Naked, Hiroko squeezes Florian as he looks between flickering curtains at the nocturnal downpour.
He turns to face her, canines protruding forward slightly and upper lip dimpled vampire-like, eyes interro
gating.
Outside, Tokyo churns.
She reaches out and fingers the silver chain and ankh around his neck, and he glances down, surprised. They study it. He wonders if she can guess its significance. If she un-clips it, and takes it as a souvenir from her white lover, he knows he will slap her.
She taps his forehead lightly instead.
"What are you thinking?" she asks.
"I am thinking -- 'Where are we going now?'"
Hiroko smiles tenderly and looks away.
"It would be difficult for us to see each other again. My children -- they are worth it."
"So, you will endure?" he asks. Hiroko nods solemnly. "Gam-bar-e?" he chants inquisitively. She nods seriously, and then grins.
~
They get dressed, and he walks Hiroko to the apartment she is staying at. High above, lights glow at the edges of balcony windows. In the balconies opposite, open windows invite the cool air.
He realises, with a certainty that is far from self-assuredness or pessimism, that this is as good as it gets; for though he might not know Tokyo well, he knows the limits of his own versatility. Certainly there will be variations on the theme -- different fireworks festivals, different Sengaku-jis, and maybe even different Hirokos. Yet though the city offers ten million people, there is only one of him.
This is as good as it gets -- and it is not good enough.
She turns, and looks at him in a motherly way.
"What about you?"
He grins. "Every good story needs someone to tell it."
She leans forward, smiling, and they share the lightest of hugs. He watches her as she swipes her card near the foyer entrance. Green light blinks; she pulls the door open, and disappears into darkness.
Ash Hibbert is a creative writing degree junkie. He has recently finished a novella for a Master of Creative Arts at the University of Melbourne in Victoria, Australia. He has also completed a Postgraduate Diploma of Creative Writing and an undergraduate degree in Professional Writing. The English-Arabic journal Kalimat and the University of Melbourne journal Strange2Shapes have published his work and he co-edited the Deakin University literary journal Verandah 15. He is also the resident writer of his own web-log, acoldandlonelystreet.blogspot.com.
Poetry by Kristine Ong Muslim
Breathless
What does it do, that thing
on the sidewalk? Somebody
has stomped on it, but it will not
call for help. The receding flood
water is taking pieces of it down
the gutter. A child rudely prods it
with a stick. It will not twitch. It will
not budge. Does it know that it has
to feel pain to be alive? It gets run
over by a car whose driver is looking
for a parking spot. Mid-afternoon and
there goes the wheel of a grocery cart
ferrying a spitting kid. And that thing
on the sidewalk, that thing with a death
smile, that thing simply will not die again.
Double Exposure
This is how I get the story right:
I forget it the moment it is captured
in the mind, do not let it hold its shape.
In my library, a famous dirty old man
tells about a bluebird that hunkers inside
all of us. It is beautiful. It must not fly out.
My favorite coffee cup turns coffee murk
into imagined sunsets; the color leaks
as it touches my mouth. I would have
liked for that moment to last. So I make
more of the same blend. But all the
other sunsets look different afterwards.
More than six hundred poems and stories by Kristine Ong Muslim have been published or are forthcoming in over three hundred publications worldwide. Her poetry can be found in numerous online journals like 42opus, Apocryphal Text, Bare Root Review, Barnwood Magazine, Blackmail Press, Blue Fifth Review, Boxcar Poetry Review, Cordite, Dog Versus Sandwich, Dogmatika, Ducts, JuiceBox, Mannequin Envy, Mastodon Dentist, Nthposition, Offcourse, Radiant Turnstile, Silenced Press, Slow Trains, Tattoo Highway, The Driftwood Review, The Fifteen Project, The Oklahoma Review, Thieves Jargon, and Zygote In My Coffee. https://www.freewebs.com/blackroom8
Poetry by Joshua Seigal
My Brainchild
(apologies, Daniel Dennett)
This is my brainchild -
my mind's eye's phenotype.
It's a double-helix wending
its way from earth to sky;
it's an emergent foal
with a long way to fall.
It needs love and sustenance.
It will recognise the contours
of your face
and become attached,
forging human bonds
above the amoebic track.
Look after my brainchild,
for now it's yours and I
can never take it back.
Nothing is Mandatory
Nothing is mandatory:
a good maxim to keep in mind
when trying to live.
Nothing holds us down - no quicksand contracts
ready to haul us under; no pointed rifle
with us in its sights.
There's no moon now,
no gravity.
no scabbing from handcuffs on our arms;
no sting but the inflammation of liberty.
I've felt the legs pulled under, and a taut rope burn
across the chest. I've seen proud minds
cave inwards.
I've seen wide white eyes turn powder grey and seem to forget
that nothing here is mandatory.
Joshua Seigal studies philosophy at University College London. He is interested in how we perceive the world, the nature of the world we perceive, and the manner in which we interact with other people. His poetry is mainly focused around the themes of memory and childhood, and he likes to remain firmly grounded in the minutiae of the everyday. He regularly performs his work in and around London. You can learn more about Josh at his WriteOutLoud profile.
Aaron Polson
Reciprocity
Guiding his mom's old sedan over the Broughton River Bridge was a simple task, especially for a drunk. Andy's head swam, a pickled brain sloshing inside a sealed container. His eyes closed, his hands drifted right, and the steering wheel moved with them. He jolted with the impact, almost tossed from his seat but for the safety belt cutting into his collarbone. One quick crunch and a spray of concrete, and the car dropped through the air...
~
Four and a half years ago, Andy pedaled home from football practice with his best friend Jason Thomas. They dropped their bikes on the sidewalk outside Gibson's discount store on the way home, slipped inside the cool, air-conditioned building, and meandered the aisles. At thirteen, the boys felt too old for toys, but risked a quick trip through the aisle of bright action figures, cars, and other gadgets. They ended their visit with the fish tank.
Andy looked at Jason, lingering for a moment on his red, puffed cheeks. "I'd like an aquarium, someday. Maybe in my room." He looked at the taut veins in Jason's neck and felt embarrassment creep into his cheeks. His eyes flashed back to the tank.
"Watch this," Jason muttered as he thrust his meaty paw into the water, seized one of the golden things, and pulled it out. Water streamed from his fist, running in crooked lines down this thick forearm. Jason slowly unpeeled his fingers, and the fish flopped from his hand and wriggled on the floor, slipping just under the shelf and out of reach. Andy dropped to the floor, groping for the fish.
"Can I help you?"
Andy sprang to his feet, his face blushing and burning. "No... just dropped a quarter... it's okay."
"Yeah." The clerk glanced at Jason. "Sure."
While the clerk walked away, Jason held the damp arm behind his back. H
e stifled a laugh with the other. "Dude, you look ridiculous on all fours, get up."
~
The sedan split the water's surface. The sound, surely thunderous from the bridge above, came as only a muted thud to Andy's ears. Cold momentum pulled the steel into the depths, the car sinking through the awful murk. Andy's glassy eyes darted around the cabin, drinking the moment, finding small trickles of black water as they pushed through cracks around the doors and windows...
~
Six months ago, Andy and Jason bounced in that old sedan as they crossed the Broughton River Bridge and followed a rough dirt road to the water. Andy held tight to the steering wheel with his left hand as his right vibrated on the gear shift knob. Jason balanced the half-full fish tank on his lap, and when the car skidded and jumped on the gravel, brown water crested the aquarium wall and sprayed on his jeans. Andy glanced at Jason's wet thigh, and an awkward moment forced his gaze to his window and the clouds unrolling above them -- an early fall storm that brought lightning and rain.
"Shit -- I'm getting fish crap all over my jeans-- " Jason lifted the tank just off his lap, trying to keep the water from splashing him as it slopped over the lip.
"We're almost there." Andy reached to the dash and pulled on the headlights as the swollen storm cut off the sun.
"Oh fuck it." Jason rolled his eyes and sat the tank back on his damp leg.
"Why the hell didn't you just dump this stupid fish in the toilet anyway?"
Andy turned to look at Jason's face, not chubby anymore, but angular and firm -- a man's face growing on top of the boy's. "I just figure I owe this fish a fighting chance."