Birthday Memorial With Tenten

On your last birthday when

Tenten was still alive

you were not

with me.

It was November 2022, when I couldn’t celebrate it

because you disappeared from my sight.

Did I tell you something wrong?

I was terrified thinking if

you might be lost

forever.

On your birthday when Tenten was beside me

I did take it for granted because

I could never imagine

she’d be gone

someday.

On your birthday when Tenten was together with me,

I was thinking of you, where you were

if you’d come back

or not.

Thanks to the gods, soon you returned to me.

Now your birthday is coming again,

with Tenten gone already.

She’s nowhere and

you are here.

I wonder how my little world

has been changed

in a year.

I listen to the radio as usual.

I hear about the ongoing

genocide inflicted

on Palestine

as well

as

the massacres in

Ukraine

now.

I’ll send you the card on your birthday,

with my special message this year:

Please stay with me

until the day

I go.

By Mayumi Yamamoto

From: Japan

Website: https://tintjournal.com/about/writers/mayumi-yamamoto

Twitter: kmusui7

Facebook URL: https://www.facebook.com/mayumi.usui.731