Receiving the ashes of the dead
drizzle falling and how quietly six hundred fifty souls
shiguretsutsu shizuka ni mo roppyaku gojū hashira
1937–1938 · Wartime verses
Sōmokutō · The Home Front (Jūgo)
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In the falling drizzle, the ashes of six hundred fifty of the dead are quietly received. Each one, counted as a "pillar," had been the whole of a single life. The magnitude of the number, and the stillness all around. Only the sound of the drizzle falls, in place of words of mourning.