Quietude

The cafe, in an old pavilion building in the grounds of one of the 'Three Great Gardens' of Japan, is hushed. I sit at a small circular table, settling, while my order, black coffee and zenzai, are prepared. The day is warm and sunny, the air clear, it is not yet June. Not yet the dripping tsuyu rains and pressing heat and with them the oppressive humidity. My eyes rest on the picture before me, framed by the open window.

            I see the wide expanse of shibafu lawn and intricately manicured pine trees bordered on the far side by low azalea bushes, now bereft of their spring colouring. The tops of Chinese elms arranged down the hill to the bottom of the huge and ancient garden, the lake beyond and a line of trees and parkland further still. Above the distant parkland rise the colourless office buildings, hotels, towers and monuments of the city of Mito.

            Not five metres from me, to my left, two young women converse through fabric face masks across a similar small table. I catch some phrases and the occasional giggle or twitter but very little else of their animated conversation. They are impeccably dressed for their day outing and totally and unquestionably focussed on each other.  

            My coffee and dessert arrive and are placed before me with deferential care. I rearrange them and my phone, glasses, notebook and pen, as if playing a game of solitary chess. I draw the lacquered bowl toward me, take up the fine japanned spoon, ease a cube of roasted mochi cake aside and scoop up a taste of the adzuki bean dessert soup, my first in many years. Sweet. Delicate. Delicious.

            There is no traffic noise here, no other customers in the room. The young waiter's slippers slip almost soundlessly across the polished floorboards.

            Like the two young friends I too have been taking in the garden, the first of the 'Great Gardens' on my list. Inside the East Gate from which I entered massive pine trees stood like sentinels. Groves of bamboo, acres of plum, cherry and other flowering fruit trees and even a fresh-water spring bubbling up through a huge, strikingly white, fashioned marble rock, graced my senses as I bathed in the late spring coolness.

            Now we are enjoying the ambiance of Koubuntei*. The local lord had this building constructed during the Meiji period for the purpose of entertaining the old and young, rich and poor amongst his people with literature readings and recitals. Now a museum/gallery our cafe sits on the second floor with a view.

            Amongst, and despite, the inevitable wide expanses of industrial sprawl and the grey grind of Japan, there exists a singular quietude. If one can ignore the incessant, repetitive and, some would say unnecessary, uber-high-pitched announcements, cautions, information, jingles and jangles, it's there. The shopping districts, the commercial hubs, the rushing transport corridors. Merely metres away, the deep hush of a residential street comes unexpected. In the temples, the tea houses, on the trains and in the sensibilities, the heart-mind of the Japanese people, sits quietude.

            I place my spoon on the edge of the saucer for a final time. Taking up my coffee I glance across to see that, in my reverie and contemplation, our two young friends have silently slipped away.

* (kou~to like / bun~literature / tei~resting place)

Owen Smith

10th May to 3rd June, 2023