Ayame (彩女) of the Clan Azuma: a Poem

Ayame (彩女)

A moonless night filled the feudal estate—

No silver-gilding glow would help them see

The approaching danger, their coming fate,

Stalking the compound from the distant trees.

Out from the darkness a warrior came—
A shadow within the shadow’s shadow—
An Azuma ninja, O dreaded name:
Ayame—scourge of her trembling foes.

Now death’s dark shadow through the castle creeps,

And it follows Ayame’s crimson path

Up to the chambers where the cruel lord sleeps,

Who will soon feel the shadow’s fatal wrath.

And soon, guard after guard will disappear,

And Kiku will too from their clutch be saved—

That child-princess whom the clan holds dear, 

Whom the lord of this compound had enslaved.

“Let no more guards my way impede or fight, 

Or by these swords, none will survive this night.”

-jwm Of the Poem The above poem is the result of a request by my daughter to write something pertaining to the video game series, Tenchu. My daughter had previously written a poem about a character in the same series who goes by the name Rin (凛), a poem she titled: I am Rin of the Benyia. Since I knew a great deal about Tenchu in general, and Ayame's character in particular (my daughter and I played this game together often), and because she did a really good job with her poem, I thought it would be fun to try and put something together. So who is this Ayame character? Ayame (彩女, pronounced 'aye-yom-ee') is a fictional character in the stealth video game series Tenchu. According to that series, which takes place in a fantasy 16th century feudal Japan, Ayame was found abandoned in Kyoto as a very young child after a devastating battle that took place during the Warring States period. She was adopted and eventually trained as a kunoichi (female ninja) by a grand master named Shiunsai Azuma (東 紫雲齋.) When she was twelve, Ayame trained as an equal along side two other male ninjas, Tatsumaru (龍丸) and Rikimaru (力丸). She would eventually become one of the most feared assassins serving the House of Lord Gohda (郷田 松之信) and dedicating especially her time and loyalty to the young Princess Kiku (菊姫, pronounced 'key-koo'), whom she treated as a younger sister.

In the poem above, I depict Ayame infiltrating an enemy castle at night in stealth, assassinating the rival clan leader, and rescuing Princess Kiku who had been kidnapped and held there as a hostage—events that did not occur in the game's storyline, but certainly could have.

To stay as true to the character as I could, I had the concluding couplet refer to 'two swords' that Ayame swears on. Throughout the entire Tenchu series, Ayame's primary weapons were two kodachi (小太刀)—that is, two short swords (swords that were commonly used by samurai during Japan's feudal period).

Before closing I might add that my poem was initially meant to be a sonnet, but my daughter thought that I should include what is now the fourth stanza—a stanza that I had been experimenting with. After having done that, and after having read the poem through, I felt the addition of that stanza not only fit well, but added wonderfully to the story. For that, I have her to thank. Thank you for stopping by. If you have played Tenchu, or are familiar with the series, I would love to know what you think of the poem. Was Ayame depicted well, did you like the storyline? Do you wish they would come out with another Tenchu? Let me know ...

A Prayer to the Lord

A Prayer

Wash us clean, O Lord, and teach us your ways—

Draw us up and out of prison

And help us to rely, in faith, on these:

Your cross, your blood, and you risen. 

-jwm

Hope's Epoch

Hope’s Epoch

How amazing to me the dawning light

Gilding with rosy flames the purple clouds

As His children below head out in crowds

To front another day with renewed might.

Fairer still, there below that amber height,

My varied kin wandering to and fro,

Blessed with many joys but besieged by woe:

These I love who conquer their daily plight …

These people my brothers and sisters are,
Whether known or unknown, or near or far.
May our common enemy, hate and fear,
Slip into oblivion’s lasting state

Til alas we with love will deem each dear,

And finally take hold of a noble fate.

-jwm

Of the Poem

Inspired by the poet Edward Robeson Taylor, and the many beautiful sonnets of his that I have recently come to know and appreciate (his classical style is for me refreshing beyond expression), I thought that I might humbly attempt one myself.

To my regret, I believe I may have written no more than a handful of sonnets over the last decade, and of these the poetic form that I chose was that of an English sonnet—otherwise known as a Shakespearean sonnet.

Taylor, who arduously experimented with the sonnet form, seems to have favored the Petrarchan model as typified by the French poets—a form whose poetic parameters seem to have been largely overlooked here in the United States. If you are visiting this page and have any interest, there is a recent article I posted which talks about the unique parameters of a French sonnet (other major sonnet forms are also highlighted there).

Inasmuch as my attempt at a French sonnet was concerned, and the subject of it, I initially began the first half of the octave praising the beauty of the sunrise as it occurs in my hometown of Aurora, Colorado. The second half of the octave was supposed to elaborate on the grunginess and beauty and diversity of the people of Aurora—all of whom I love and wanted to boast about.

My initial endeavor was to personify Aurora as a sort of mother’s beauty brooding carefully over her children as a new and renewed day approached them.

How amazing to me your dawning light,

Gilding with rosy flames the the purple clouds,

As your children below head out in crowds

To front another day with renewed might …

… children “bedeviled about by so many cares” and just desiring happiness. But the poem took a turn as a result of other things I was studying.

I was reading a powerful poem written by Jamaican poet, Claude McKay. The poem, which is a sonnet and a must needs read, is called If We Must Die. It is a poem about brutal oppression, the inability to tolerate it anymore, and an invocation to fight violently against it. The poem was essentially a response to a series of violent racest riots that occurred in 1919, a period known historically as the Red Summer.

After having read about these terrible events a sort of hopelessness and grief lingered with me, a sadness within me that we humans have it in us to be so hateful—murderously hateful—toward one another. It never seems to end, and when I begin to believe that humanity is progressing toward some higher goodness, invariably it seems that some next-level, monumental evil comes in and eclipses that hope. Still, I had to remind myself, if any of us wants to see change we cannot stop hoping for it, and the only way of effecting change is to change ourselves.

It was on this thinking that I began to edit the octave of the poem I began about my hometown and the diversity of its people, and began to ‘universalize’ it. I had the poem open with a new day, a new dawning light as the world (His children) sets out to face and make something of it.

Note the human condition as laid out in the octave: ‘fronting existence’, wandering to and fro (as if lost), besieged by woe, and yet still having within ourselves many joys. Note also how the narrator deems the diversity of the human race (my varied kin) as more beautiful (fairer still) than even that of the dawning morning sky—he especially has love for those who endeavor to overcome their plight (i.e. the human condition).

In a French sonnet the volta or turn in the poem occurs in lines 9 and 10 where a rhyming couplet is employed. In the case of this poem, the volta is an open acknowledgement that all people, whether known or unknown, are as close family to the narrator, and that this perspective must be held if effective and meaningful change is to occur in the world (as the following lines indicate).

The quatrain which then follows concludes with the idea that the enemy we face is not one another, it is xenophobia (fear) and prejudice (hate), and that these must of necessity be lifted if there is to be any hope for humanity. Indeed, the narrator suggests, it is only by banishing these in ourselves that one can even engender the kind of disposition that can love others as if they were our closest kin and family.

Imagine if this were the general disposition or creed of the American population of 1919, one could hardly imagine that the race-hating atrocities which occurred that year would have happened as it did, or at least not to the scale that it did. Imagine, what if this were the general disposition of people globally? What a difference it would make … we might even be able to change our fate.

If you are visiting this page and read this article, I would love to know your thoughts. How did you come to find interest in poetry? Have you written a French sonnet (or any other sonnet types)? How do you like the poem posted in this particular post? Any views on xenophobia and/or prejudice that you might have seen? If you are from another country, what kind of racial issues occur where you are from, and what solutions are being employed there to reduce it? I could go on and on. Nevertheless, I would love to hear from you. Thanks for stopping by.

Jean-François Millet's The Gleaners and Poetry

The Wheat Fields

Lo, the drowsy heat of summer

Hanging humid, low and near,
As peasants gleaning frail and humble

Thank the Lord whom they revere.

Lo, the wheat-line yon receding

Into gray obscurity—

How thankless greed absconds with nature

And her virgin purity …

-jwm

Poetic Parameters:

Stanza Type: Quatrain

Meter: Line 1 in each stanza is eight syllables; lines 2 and 4 in each stanza is seven syllables; and line 3 in each stanza is nine syllables

Rhyme Scheme: xaxa xbxb (where ‘x’ represents unrhymed lines)

Composition: May 19, 2019

This poem was inspired by an 1857 painting titled, The Gleaners; a work of art produced by Jean-FrançoisMillet (1814 – 1875). One of the founders of the Barbizon School, Millet’s realist style significantly helped usher in the modern period of art.

Millet had an empathetic eye for conditions surrounding the rural life of peasant farmers, as he himself grew up in these conditions. After having trained in Cherbourg and the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, and after the French Revolution, Millet moved to the village of Barbizon to paint the harsh life of rural peasantry.

The Gleaners was first exhibited in Salon in 1857. It was initially received with criticism as it seemed to glorify the arduous existence of the impoverished- an implicit condemnation of the middle- and upper-class tiers of society. It did not help that the poor significantly outnumbered the rich, and that there was a palpable tension between the lower-class and those who were well off.

Lo, the drowsy heat of summer

Hanging humid, low and near,

As peasants gleaning frail and humble

Thank the Lord whom they revere.

The first stanza of the poem focuses on the peasants who are gathering up scraps of leftover wheat grain. Despite the wafting heat of the heavy summer day, and despite the scarcity of wheat left, I wanted the stanza to depict the poor as thankful that Providence has brought them the opportunity to gather food together. I wanted to depict them as grateful harvesters of nature’s bounty.

Lo, the wheat-line yon receding

Into gray obscurity—

How thankless greed absconds with nature

And her virgin purity …

The second stanza is an entirely different story. The abundance of wheat, if you look off into the distance of the painting by clicking the image, seems to be disappearing at an alarming rate, as if being devoured by some ravenous entity.

Wholescale farming is, of course, necessary, but the poem wants to do two things. It wants to magnify the rapacious indifference of the process- a sort of  thankless, and even violent apathy with regard to what is being done, as if nature herself were being plundered. 

The poem also wants to show the disparity between the poor and the rich: between the peasants who are both humble and thankful; and the overabundance achieved by insatiable greed (represented by the overseer on the horse).

In short, the second stanza is a diatribe aimed at greed- whose destructive proclivity wreaks havoc on both nature and humanity.

The last element of the poem is the ellipsis at the end, an indicator that this marauding of nature is ceaseless.

An Idyll of Virtue

An Idyll of Virtue

When Virtue grows weary within and is old

And all signs of her youth disappear

You will note how the sky will seem paler and cold

And how autumn seems eerily near

When alas she departs and slips into night                      

You will note how the maples are bare

When her voice isn’t heard and when gone is her light

You will know then that winter is here

-jwm

Of the Poem

An Idyll of Virtue is a tragic cautionary poem about the decline of moral propriety within an individual, or a group of individuals, or even a nation.

Modeled on Theocritus’ (270 BC) ten pastoral poems, an idyll is a pastoral work that meditates upon themes revolving around nature, rural existence, the seasons, and other such agrarian topics. The word itself comes from the Greek word eidyllion (ειδύλλιο), meaning ‘little picture’ or ‘short poem’.

The title of the poem is a play on words, where idyll serves as an allusion to ‘idleness’- indicating therefore an idleness with regard to a virtuous disposition.

The pastoral elements that I draw upon are the environmental changes that are emerging as a result of seasonal changes from autumn to winter- where autumn is contrasted with old age (propriety in decline), and winter is contrasted with death (a state of being morally reprobate).

I was hoping in this particular work to represent Virtue’s old age as a sort of process of desolation, and to compound that representation with autumn- a season where blue skies are made deathly pale, and all of the green foliage begins to wither away as winter’s desolation swallows everything up.

When our conscience ceases to call, and when we are no longer guided by truths (‘when her voice isn’t heard and when gone is her light’) it is a grim sign of moral and spiritual privation (i.e. winter), so the poem warns.

It is said that we are governed by the principles we assume. I wrote this poem as a sort of reminder to be diligent with regard to the kind of person I want to be, to hold on to principles that are pleasing to the Lord, that are useful to my neighbor, and that are edifying to me.

Poetic Parameters

Stanza Type: Quatrain

Meter: The first line of each stanza contains eleven syllables; the second and fourth lines of each stanza contains nine syllables; and the third line of each contains twelve syllables. 

Rhyme Scheme: abab cbcb

Composition: February 5th, 2019