This year, the Australia-Japan Society of Victoria warmly collaborated with Writers in Kyoto in offering a complimentary one-year membership for an exemplary piece submitted by an Australian author to our Kyoto Writing Competition. Simon Rowe’s “Diary of a Rickshaw Puller” was selected for this honor. Simon is an Australian writer based in Himeji, Japan and is a 2021 International Rubery Book Award nominee, winner of the 2021 Best Indie Book Award and the 2013 Asian Short Screenplay Contest. His nonfiction has appeared in The Paris Review, the New York Times, TIME (Asia), the South China Morning Post, and The Australian. Website: https://www.mightytales.net/
For the competition judges, the skillfully-crafted verses in this delightful piece masterfully evoked tactile sensations of previous visits to the western side of Kyoto city. Readers follow the path of a tourist rickshaw winding its usual route, providing a well-narrated tour of one of Kyoto’s traditional sections. However, the subtle rapture of pulling a kimono-clad beauty inspires poetic fantasies in the young man doing the work. The rickshaw puller is rewarded with an unexpected, but hoped for, surprise.
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Diary of a Rickshaw Puller
At Togetsukyo Bridge
awaiting customers
faces reflected in water
School excursion —
blue, white, and freshly laundered
a carnival passes me by
Lovingly polished
wheels of chrome, lacquer wood
who’ll ever know?
Sipping hot coffee
quickly —
a customer!
Her slender feet
white rabbits beneath
a peach kimono
Sunlight on her nape
my breath quickens
as I join the morning traffic
On a forest path
her sigh — or mine?
scent of bamboo
At Nonomiya Shrine —
care to make a wish
for love?
Nearing Jojakkoji Temple
a bush warbler sings
she speaks of a husband
Mountain breeze —
tailwind to Takiguchidera
her husband in Tokyo!
Uphill to Nisonin Temple
dew on hydrangeas
sweat beads my brow
Matcha ice cream —
her glistening lips
beneath a kiosk parasol
Passing Rakushida
ghost of Basho smiles
life is poetry!
At Seiryoji Temple
a lotus pond
from mud a flower blooms
Crossing railway lines
gently —
so as not to startle her
Towards Togetsukyo Bridge
my heart
a pounding drum
Alighting riverside
her hand in mine
coolness of silk
A school excursion —
her smiling face lost
in a river of blue
In my hand
folding faces of Fukuzawa
a phone number inside!
