Shuntaro Tanikawa

Shuntaro Tanikawa (b 1931) is a Japanese poet. He was a member of 'Teki' group that led the second most important poetic movement in postwar Japan.

Wisdom & Quotes

• age three

there was no past for me
age five
my past went back to yesterday
age seven
my past went back to topknotted samurai
age eleven
my past went back to dinosaurs
age fourteen
my past agreed with the texts at school
age sixteen
I look at the infinity of my past with fear
age eighteen
I know not a thing about time.

• In killing, I tried to make sure of men and myself

my
youthful way of proving was studded in colours of blood
but with
the blood of other men I couldn't paint away the blue
sky I
need my own I got it today...
- in a peom on Billy the Kid

• Vast landscapes bring men to a halt,

Then men become aware of being surrounded
by profuse remotenesses
They are always
Remotenesses that make men
men.
...................
Occasionally man cannot exceed the place
that transgresses every remoteness,
Without being seen anymore
Man at such times becomes the landscape.
- Rokujuni no sonetto (Sixty-two Sonnets)

Rajneesh