The Farewell

       Konishi Sahei closed his ancient, grey eyes and inhaled deeply. The small room was suffused with the smell of chrysanthemum. He liked that; it reminded him of his younger days. 

       Opening his eyes once again, he became aware of the charcoal pit beside him. The water in the chagama – the traditional metal kettle used in the Japanese tea ceremony – had begun to simmer and sigh, and he listened to its gentle music. For a moment, he studied the simple vessel – its perfect, rounded shape dotted with minor, intended imperfections; the uneveness of its cast iron surface; the delicate balance between tradition and innovation. For a brief moment, he recalled his good friend, Kazunori – the skilled craftsman who had forged the kettle he was now using – and mourned his recent passing. No longer would the artisan’s talented hands create implements such as this. No longer would he engage in the artistic and philosophical conversations with his talented acquaintance. No longer would he be privy to pithy comments and insights.

       He sighed. Truly Kazunori’s passing was most certainly a great blow to the community. And possibly a great loss to the entire province. In an attempt to dispel his melancholic thoughts of his his artisan friend, he forced himself to look away from the kettle for a moment, focusing on anything else that would pry his thoughts from the artisan’s death.

        His eyes were immediately drawn to the bonsai tree in the nearby tokonoma – the small traditional alcove in most homes of this type – and the shallow ceramic tray housing it, pure white with scenes of verdant forests painted upon it in shades of blue. Pausing, he studied the short, inward-curving needles of the minature cryptomeria evergreen. While once a beautiful green, they were now marked with browning patches and withering. Like all else within Kunoshima, its life was waning. He thought back to when he had first acquired the tree as a tiny sapling, pruning and training it until the result was an artful miniature replica of the full-grown tree. Like his friend Kazunori, all that was gone, in the past now.

       Sahei sighed deeply as his attention returned to the present, leaving his sorrowful musings for another time. His elderly hand reached for the curved bamboo scoop and spooned what was left of the pale green powder into a rough-textured bowl. Pouring water into it from the kettle, the old man whipped the powder into a froth with a nearby whisk and laid the bowl in front of him. After returning the implements to their proper places, he cradled the bowl in both hands and raised it to his parched lips.

       He pondered the steaming mixture before him. It was quite good, surprisingly more so than usual. Perhaps because it was the last of the tea. Whatever the reason, it succeeded in calming his spirit. Calm. He needed that. Especially after what had recently transpired.

       He stared blankly into the tea-bowl, and into the reflection of his own eyes that gazed back at him. His body was feeble, but his mind was still quite keen. He could remember the ancient history of his village as if it was yesterday, and it all came back to him in rapid, flowing images—

       Kunoshima had once been a thriving village in the southern realm of Musashi Province. Over the course of the last four years, however, the normally bountiful harvest had begun to decrease steadily until once-thriving farms were reduced to wasteland. Famine had struck. Many moved elsewhere. Many stayed and died. Kunoshima was finished.

       It was no longer the home he had once known. The fields were barren. The village was all but deserted. Even the local shrine he knew so well as a boy seemed lifeless, defunct. Nothing at all was left for him here.

       Sahei’s dusky eyes rippled upon the surface of the tea, manifested into a score of children’s faces – farmer and warrior alike – who would never grow to see adulthood, their newly erected grave markers cold grey sign posts pointing the way to their next incarnations.

       The elder took another sip of his tea in an attempt to dispel the image. “All dead,” he murmured to himself. Dead. Just like the village he had come to love so well. Slowly, he moved to a low, birchwood table that rose not more than a foot above the woven straw flooring, retrieved a long wooden brush and took a deep cleansing breath.

       His wizened hand cradled the old brush in a delicate, almost feminine grip. The instrument had long since become a part of him, its deep wood finish smoothed and tinted by the very oils from his fingertips, the result of nearly two decades of continual use. Gently, the brush delved into the ink, withdrew and was carefully applied to the fragile sheet of rice paper laid out before him. The brushstrokes long, flowing, deliberate; an ebony trail contrasting against the pale, grainy background of the rice paper.

       His calligraphy had often calmed him when he could not sleep, and the prior night’s slumber had been quite elusive. His eyes peered outward through an opened shoji screen and, tilting his head slightly, he gazed upward into the morning sky. A gentle gust of cold air caressed his cheek.

       The old man’s hand once again moved towards the paper, made one final stroke, then laid the brush aside. He examined the vivid ideogram on the paper before him: the character bu, meaning “war”. Yet bu, as was the case with many Japanese characters, also had a second meaning: to cease the struggle; to sheathe the sword. He considered the paradox. It was appropriate. Was it not the nature of all things to fight for survival? Yet, was it also not true that all things must, at some point, learn to cease their useless struggle – whether against an armed opponent or, as was the case now, against nature herself? 

       “Yes, fate paints such a strange picture,” he admitted to himself.

       His train of thought was suddenly broken by the incipient birdsong whose source seemed to originate from behind him. Turning his head, he spied the finch in its frail bamboo cage. The elder smiled and consumed the balance of his tea, emptying the bowl with an audible slurp. He rose to his feet slowly, his bones seemingly creaking with every movement as he made his way across the room. Opening the tiny wooden door, the elder placed a hand within the cage. Suddenly silent, the bird cowered in one corner until, satisfied that its intruder meant no harm, it hopped upon a withered finger.

       Moving to a partially opened screen, the old man extended his arm past the partition and watched intently as the tiny finch cocked a curious head in his direction. After what seemed like an eternity, the bird spread its wings and fluttered onto a nearby tree branch. Peering back for one fleeting moment, it took to flight and quickly disappeared into the cloudless sky, a black-and-yellow speck engulfed in an endless sea of cerulean. 

       Satisfied, Konishi Sahei closed the screen with a hollow clack as a single teardrop rolled slowly down his cheek.

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