| mother_tongue | ||
| kaibutsu |
In a certain mountain village nestled deep in a country known only for its mountains, I met a woman who has forgotten her native language. She came to this town when she was very young, she told me, to marry a soldier returning from the war. In those days she was beautiful, and could have had any soldier she wanted. But now, she was ancient, married fifty years and widowed ten more, short, round at the waist, and wearing a peasant's skirts instead of a city girl's dresses. She wonders if that young woman is still buried inside of her, somewhere underneath the fat and the wrinkles, the memories of good times and ill. Maybe her younger self has gone completely from the world, and is now only remembered. Perhaps the young woman is already in heaven, while the old still waits to be judged. |
040307 |