What happened to you?

 

Blood and sweat rolling down your mangled form.

 

You're tumbling.You're rolling down.

 

It’s… a time we should mourn you. For will we ever be able to bring back such a pure thing to this cruel world? Will we see you ever again, the real you?

 

These are questions I ask myself daily. In the night I fret, in the day I weep.

 

In the days of old. When you were still healthy. When wielding a blade brought the full virtue of a refined man, there was purity. Simplicity. Centuries spent in bliss, nothing but acceptance. Acceptance of life and nature. We walked around the cherry blossom wide eyed, we never took for granted what had been bestowed on us.

 

In the lakes shoals of fish swam glistening in the light, a flurry of colours. Every now and then, a pink leaf used to fall on the pond; with a sharp sideways movement and a flash, it would be dragged under the depths. The pink leaf used to fall into the ground sometimes as well, it would bind with the soil, it would age until it became a grey shred of its former self. Just as a child grows and then greys and shrivels. We never cried, we never took a magic pill to feel better, we raised our aging hands to the rising sun and bowed in gratitude to you. Your warmth and strength.

 

Falling…

 

In the days before the West came, in the days before the Chinese came, in the days before smoke and steel came. There was. T-there... Peace, yes. There was perfection.

 

Instead of chemicals and paper infected with formulas and logic there was the ceremony. A cool green powder morphing into tea. Nothing more yet there was so much more. Every movement mastered, everything understood; the youth now learn of the impractical and inapplicable. They must learn how pieces of things we can’t see interact with other pieces of things we can’t understand. Wasting their lives of random junk floating in the sky instead of feeling the warmth of matcha tea radiating into their clasped hands around a tea bowl after labouring in the fields like my father did. No more! No more! They cry, no more simplicity. Only logic and its western pretentiousness will lead us.

 

So you started to get feverish…

 

Don’t you remember just before you felt sick? I do. It makes me smile to remember those moments of freedom. There were signs though, signs of the disease. Ships, many ships. So many the ports were a forest of engraved wood, not crafted like our rafts though. These are American warships. Struggling to stay afloat under the dead weight of more cannons then sense. These outsiders knocked on your doorstep. You had to let them in, they had guns and arrogance; they are famous for that little catch are they not?

 

Soon there were arguments. Petty power struggles. Divine or military. The old ways and the new ways. What was to be done? Except a struggle of course, a proof of victory to abolish all the doubts from the gaijins’ mysterious lips.

 

My town rallied under the banner of the old stable ways. My community came together, the men hugged their finely dressed wives while holding the small hands of future warriors. The couples cried on each other's shoulders, their tears mingled and their souls wrapped around each other, becoming one for just that short moment. Then the man lifted his weapon and the wife picked up the child. They locked eyes but this time it was different; a more fierce commitment then I have ever seen.

 

The men then came together and with stern faces moved on the path to war, the wives, hiding their anxiety, took their children home, for in a world of war that is when the youth must learn to bear katanas and courage.

 

Gasping for air you started to cough blood…

 

It did not go well, of course it did not.

 

Guns.

 

Guns, guns, guns! Rows of men armed with explosives and blackpowder.  With a swift charge, my father and his comrades waded into their killzone.

 

Choking in a jungle of smoke, the samurais could do little but stumble in the darkness, their flashing blades obscured, hidden from their wielder. When they emerged from the hell hole to face these faceless rows of men, they realised they had left something behind them. There was a whole in each of their chests, they lost their heart. It must be somewhere, desperately swiping as they went back into the black cloud they found their hearts. Too late. Their savagery got hold of them, their years of learning the art of war gone, for in that moment they realised that hole in their chest was bleeding, they had just pulled out the bullet. As they writhed in the ground reciting their death poems, as they swam in the hot soup of life they held on their katanas. “Having died once, you won’t die again”, they rasped.

 

When the smoke cleared the musket men thrusted bayonets into the living and kicked the dead. Just like that the west had come, you started to write didn't you? Death poems, cries for help. Meaning, desperation, survival.

 

Their fancy ships and weapons mutilated the honourable bodies of men in ways that seem unimaginable, impossible to comprehend. They had knocked at our doorstep and we tried to shove them outside, no greeting, they deserve no such thing.

 

Your life is flitting before your very eyes...

 

Their poisonous need for freedom and complexity flowed into our lives. Washing over our old ways like acid over a teapot. They forced mathematics and democracy down the youth’s throats as they screamed and fought for breath, after a while they stopped, their arms fell to their sides and they blindly stared at their school work and nodded in understanding. They speak in a soft tongue and do not breathe the air of their culture. Forced to the grindstone at offices. A rifle is put to their beaten hands, their pen is flung from their grasp and these poor weaklings are told how to use this unholy instrument. Told how to pierce not only the armour of a warrior but also his spirit, his heart, to fracture his mind with shrapnel.

 

In the 80 years of my life. You have changed so much; you have been pushed away by the west and have now fallen off the cliff into the pit of fashion and pathetic advancement.

 

For over a thousand years we slowly progressed, refined our skills, refined our minds. We have taken the wise words of the great people who roamed among us on this island and even foreigners from the lands to the east, yet we never... never did we ever advance for the sake of it. Why not balance instead of stumble forwards?

 

No. We demand newspapers, we demand communication, we demand trains! We want disgusting food from the other side of the world. It's all what they want in their addicted brains to indulge in the next new thing. 

 

Oh what has happened to our youth? Please tell me, what can I do to make you a better Mother Nihon?

 

I write plans. I discuss. They treat me like a drunk man, one who smells of depression and radiatiates desperation. I am neither of those things, I am your last supporter Mother Nihon, and I will make sure you survive.

 

Poor men. They are lost in this world now. Their heads down and minds bent in horrific ways. No longer can they prove themselves, no longer are they allowed to truly work. Pen in hand and business suits on them roam from place to place as lost spirits. In the times of old they would have had people to convert them, to change them to grab their tool of choice and get to work. It is not so simple anymore though.

 

The women. Long pieces of paper smoking from their mouths and horrid clothing. Strutting in the streets of Tokyo. No longer are they a present, no longer are they a gift. When they were crafted with silk and cared for over many years, now they only serve themselves.

 

That is why I must destroy this imperial trespass on our land. To rid the home of spirits of the soft westerners who plague our art and culture. We need the shogunate back.

 

Walking down the street I come across a garden. An old garden. A traditional garden. In this green space lies whispers of a greater Japan. If you listen closely you might catch words. Words of gaining what was once ours. The Meiji government is a mere copy cat of the German Empire! They preach. No one listens, no one understands.

 

Except me.

 

We must regain what we have lost and put back to power what is important to us. Do you believe me Nihon? I want you to be free from the western pestilence, to breath and smile. Will you let me help you?

 

Well I know exactly how to save you Mother Nihon. Exactly how to. It will take some of the things that have haunted you in your feverish dreams though. I am going to use the same venom that the snake used to bite you. Revolvers and politics. These two evils must be overcome for us to be happy but I must learn them. Not only that, there are others, Nihon, ready by your side. 

 

You might think you are alone but that is where luckily, you are wrong.

 

When you become better, who do I call you in this new world Nihon?

 

Will you be changed? Will we call you Mother Japan instead like the West does? Will you stay like you are now, dying?

 

***************************************************************************

 

It has been several months. I’ve decided to call you Mother Japan. You are right, maybe I remember the old days with rose tinted glasses after all. One thing is simple though. Whether we compromise with the gaijin or follow the path to stability we are ready to serve you.

 

That is why tonight Mother Japan, I will put my life in your hands for I am about to serve you.  We will act on the wishes of the public those years ago against the Americans. They may have failed to boycott their goods, but I'll be there to make sure every drop of whisky and damn American poison is deported back to their horrid lands.

 

We are doing everything we can Mother .Our men are setting up explosives on one of our trains, a reason to go to war with China. We will make it right! For years the power has been in the hands of the people who wield the katana, we have decided that we could restore you from sickness. We may wield bayonets now but… it will be the same as before i’m sure of it. So sure. I want you back, Mother Japan.

 

***************************************************************************

 

It is time. The war has started. Japan can finally prove it is no longer a slave! I wept with joy! Mother, I know you are proud of me.

 

But…

 

Then a week went by. A second week and… It is not what I hoped. Not at all. It’s practically a coup! The usurp of the government is not for you, but it is for their personal gain. I must stop them for you.  So once again I start plotting. I did not see the signs last time, they were officers, under the government’s nose. It takes a certain kind of insanity to do that. I’m doing this alone. I will do it for you and only I will ensure that Japan has a future free of both the west and this twisted army. I am here to ser-

 

“Good morning sir!”, I hear behind me.

 

“Yes?”.

 

She says nothing, but her eyes tell a million words of advice for me. Look at me with a smile before walking away.

 

What was that? I wonder.

 

Then I look down. Sake stained clothes. A drunken man’s breath.

 

Mother was this you?

 

I don’t know what to say! Crumpling next to a bench I sigh. Realising that Japan will die, I was the one who caused it. My repulsive state is just a punishment. Her last act before her death. 

 

I wake up with a headache. A raging headache. Reality dawns on me. She is no longer in my head. The factories bloom with smoke and weapons are being handed out to soldiers. I am sorry I did this Mother, so sorry…

 

The country has fallen for the myth of a greater Japan. Me included.

 

Will I live to see it repaired?