The simplest outcome is always the easiest to report back on. As a follow up to my previous post, I can announce, belatedly, that Terunofuji was the winner of the spring bashou. Very few people could be unhappy about the result, given the rikishi's amazing return from injury. Terunofunji will become an ozeki for the summer meet and if he is consistent, could be in line for promotion to yokozuna later this year, an honour bestowed on very few.

I watched the sumo highlights daily and got to know more and more about the ringside setup. It's also instructive to look into the audience now and then to catch sight of a kimono or a supporting banner or just people cheering for their favourite. There was one thing I noticed every day. A woman sitting in the second row with a beautifully upright posture. She occupied the same spot on all fifteen days of the tourney. I am sure she won't mind this blurry shot of her, dressed in white, just to rear of the Onosho, the wrestler in black. The other wrestler is Takayasu, the winner of the bout.

I wonder what her story is, prosaic, poetic? If I was a good writer, I might make her into a short story.

We have reached the final day of the March Grand Sumo Tournament in Tokyo and there are four possible winners of the Emperor's Cup. There are also a number of ways the final day might play out. Consider the following rankings from the Nihon Sumo Kyokai:

If leader Terunofuji wins today, then it's all over red rover. He takes the title. But if he loses to Ozeki Takakeisho, they will be square at 11 apiece. By a beautiful twist of fate, the two other 10-4 men are matched up today. Takayasu takes on Aoiyama. Whoever wins that bout will move to 11-4, so in theory, three men could finish on 11 wins each.

I have never experienced such a three-way playoff before and the thought of it could make for an exciting finish. In my heart I hope that Terunofuji takes the title. He will almost certainly be promoted to the Ozeki rank in the next tourney, completing his remarkable comeback from injury and relegation to the lower divisions. I'd love to see him holding the Emperor's Cup this evening, but as for that, whatever the outcome, sumo is the ultimate winner this time around.

My relative incapacity has kept me largely housebound and inactive for weeks now, save for the one trip a fortnight to the city and a daily stretching routine for the blasted tendon. So I have been looking around for alternate means of transport.

I settled at first for an eScooter, surely a great way of zooming to the station or the shops. But then I learned that such devices were not legal on NSW roads or footpaths. Australian governments tend to be conservative that way.

Reluctantly I was drawn towards an eBike, for though I already have a serviceable mountain bike, the hills are too much for me in my condition. So yesterday I bought one online and on Monday I will pick it up.

I promise a review of sorts, should you be interested in joining me for some fresh air.

Today was the first sight of the sun in over a week. The big wet appears to have stalled for the moment, leaving all and sundry truly sodden.

Walking the length of my garden today in my wellies revealed a trail of tiny disasters - the dislodging of small plants, the networks of micro-ravines that the torrents had cut, messes of sticks, branches and drowned leaves. I lot of top soil has run off too.

At the pool this morning I gazed up at the fast moving wisps of cloud that lost their shape even I as looked at them. All seemed alive with wind and sunlight - activity brought on by the change of weather.

Moments of such alteration are worth treasuring. 

Showers

Autumn rain, a

fervent drenching

on skin and bone, a

mild shellacking.

once again.

The carapace of day

slackens,

stilled beat

of lagging sun,

and play

of angled light -

makes mute shadows

run the pools

that twilight

gathers,

or so it seems.

Autumn is, at last, 

a serious time,

the unreplenished-

for summer past,

for winter coming,

a stripping

season.

I watched an NHK documentary today that somehow I managed to miss five years ago. It was rebroadcast on the anniversary of the Great East Japan Earthquake, the event which created the tsunami that wiped out towns and villages in 2011. Thousands died and many are still missing, presumed dead.

"The Phone of the Wind" follows the story of some of the relatives of those who died as they visit a phone booth set on private land in the town of Otsuchi in Iwate Prefecture. Created by a kindly gentleman who was dealing with his own issues of grief, the simple white telephone booth with the black phone that has no material connection to the outside world, allows people to speak with their loved ones, often for the first time.

Lest you think this sounds crazy, pause to consider the deep shock that would have resulted from world's suddenly turned upside and people never seen again. Without warning. The phone gives people a chance to open up about their feelings, come to better terms with what has occurred, perhaps to say goodbye.

It's a beautiful documentary, precious, and a tearjerker to boot. An antidote to cynicism and aimlessness. I recommend it wholeheartedly.

(photo: Alessia Cerantola)

After a long hiatus that needs no explanation, I will finally return to a live choir rehearsal tonight. I think my last outing was around late March or early April, 2020. These were followed by months of tepid Zoom rehearsals, which, while they meant I could stay home and grab a cuppa when I wanted to, lacked the immediacy and camaraderie that live singing entails. Still, it was Zoom or nothing and fortunately Zoom won out.

I have written before about how choir membership changed the direction of my life, offering up as a bonus, relationships, travel and work that I could never have foreseen. I didn't join my first choir almost 30 years ago with these benefits in mind - no, I just wanted to sing. I hadn't done so in a chorus since primary school. Most of the time I have sung as a tenor but the dearth of male singers in acapella groups have pushed all the men into the realm of the basses, mores the pity.

I have been thinking lately about joining a chamber choir as I'd really like to sing that kind of music, or at least have a crack at it. Perhaps such a group will hove into view soon and maybe I will get my chance.

 A couple of years ago I chanced upon a translation of the Cold Mountain poems of the semi-mythical Han Shan. These poems where only rediscovered in a monastery in the 20th Century, having laid unseen for almost a thousand years. Han Shan might best be described as an eccentric Buddhist recluse, one leaning towards a more Zen form of the discipline, a kind that emphasizes meditation over book learning. 

Han Shan is likely a composite of many writers who adopted this form of Buddhism, one which was also happy to borrow from Daoism. For these men a lifestyle situated on remote T'ien T'ai Mountain meant considerable physical hardship, one that was likely made possible only by long periods of meditation. The poems that they wrote were often found displayed on rocks and trees and may have been collected by a temple for teaching purposes. Who knows, it was a long time ago.

Anyway, yesterday I came upon another translation, by J.P. Seaton, and this poem, #68, if from that collection.

Living on Cold Mountain, I got free of the world,
Not even a mantra hung on my heart,
Maybe a line of a poem might get scribbled on a
rock wall,
Me, drifting home, like the unmoored boat.

Being laid-up with an injury, or as good as laid-up, has meant a lot of enforced sitting around. The circle of enclosure has grown even smaller in the past week or so, as the tendinosis remains stubbornly flared up. The one glimmer I can find in this whole melancholic episode is that I have been able to catch up on a lot of British crime drama.

I first watched Inspector Morse at least twenty years ago, likely more, and I have forgotten most of what I did watch. So having the Trinity College of Endeavour, Inspector Morse and Lewis available on a subscription, I dove into the unlikely world of Oxford crime, where the murderers seem to outnumber the dons. In fact the latter are often found amongst the former, such is the competitive world of university life.

Well written, well cast and well acted makes them a joy to watch, even if I didn't go to Oxford myself. But if I had, perhaps I would have ended up floating in the Cherwell. The University of NSW, gigantic beast that it is, has no rivers, though there is a nearby beach. 

Autumn

Autumn of my days,

Sun through smeared glass,

The way light shimmies

On kettle and bench

And then, away.

A spider-light that

Holds but never stays,

Folds and flattens

And creeps upon the grass.

I follow slyly,

The shaded spinney,

Along a shed,

Past piles of wood.

For every thread of

Light that undulates,

Another is dead,

Leaving a darkening

Plane beneath - 

Most like my thoughts,

Instead.