Poem Reading: "Late Gathering" by Chika Sagawa

I remember the experience of reading this book. It was Springtime in Seattle, maybe three years ago. I would read it exclusively on walks outside, roaming around the residential streets and lavishing in the late afternoon sunlight. I think it added to the experience of poems like what I’ve read here, “Late Gathering,” which are such social documentations at their core and yet reach for that flicker of spirit that unites us all through our desire for connection.

Sagawa and Nakayasu do such an excellent job at narrating concision — it’s oftentimes a tricky task, in translation, when you have so few words to get right, that each word must somehow be exactly as it is intended otherwise the moment may become lost. I think of the line “Thin drooping folds of grass send out the slightest breeze,” and wonder what if breeze was ‘gasp,’ or more distant, ‘air.’ Not too far off from breeze, and yet so wholly different.

The poem "Late Gathering" by the poet Chika Sagawa.

You can purchase the Collected Poems of Chika Sagawa here.