Mujou Paper

An essay that’s not quite an essay, part musing on mujou, part collection of poems, part trip to mujouland, and part boring story time. Sorry about that last bit.

Mujou has been on my mind since this assignment began. To me, it is a concept which is constantly present. And, now that I have it connected with our class, literary references pop up when I muse on the concept. In the theme of being mujou, I decided to take a walk instead of writing this paper, mostly because it was soon to be my favorite embodiment of mujou, the time of day when it’s twilight; yugure. Mujou as a concept can be freeing, comforting, beautiful or even a bit scary in knowing that nothing is ever constant. For me at that moment in time it was freeing.

Transience and mutability were how mujou was introduced to me. And starting off on my walk that was how I was feeling. Nothing was planned, my feet we free to walk as much or as little as they wanted, in whichever direction they wanted. Walking down a trail I felt free, not tied down by work or distracted by possessions. Mujou was on my brain, and, in the spirit of mujou I soon split off of the trail I had been walking on, deciding to continue down an offshoot which I had no idea about or even if it would go anywhere. But at that time, it was perfect, a way to travel an unpredictable road.

Entering upon the quiet park it led into, I reflected back to common traits of some of the first poems we had read in class, such as the ones in the Kokinshu. These poems almost always connected with nature, often placing it first. Now, I felt as if nature was first; little raccoon prints dotted a muddy stream bank, a scene which was beautiful, but also quite fragile; the prints would not last, and the sunlight dappling the water’s surface would soon melt away. I felt entranced by the tranquility and fleetingness of the world before me, just as many poets must have been by their surroundings. If a poem could reflect my thoughts at the time, it would have to be this anonymously written poem;
“It’s their falling without regret
I admire-
Cherry blossoms:
a world of sadness
if they’d stayed.”
To me, the most beautiful moments are often the most fleeting; I do not feel as if the little joys in life could hold the same power over me if they were commonplace and constant. This is one of the qualities I enjoy most about mujou scenes.

Continuing on, I exited the forest and departed from the stream. As I had hoped, this path was now leading me in an unexpected direction. The sudden change in landscape and direction too made me think of mujou, as the forest that seemed to continue on was suddenly cut by fields and houses. Though I was further from nature I was also now in a more free environment. Crossing a stream, I mused upon repeating the actions of Buson by
“Crossing a summer
stream- what fun!
sandals in hand”
but resisted, remembering I was not in ancient Japan at the sight of the bits of trash resting in the shallow stream bottom. Although this removed me somewhat from the perfect sense of tranquility I had been in before, I still couldn’t help but think of mujou as the stream itself had been unexpected in this now more human setting, and it too seemed fragile, as if it might disappear with the lack of future rain.

As I now walked further on, I came to reflect on Saigyou, and his travels. I was now traveling directly facing my shadow; whom now became my traveling companion. I thought how traveling by foot was so simplistic and natural, and how Saigyou, like myself at the time would have been content without possessions, just letting himself be free to experience both nature and people. Although my walk was no comparison to what he must have done, I really felt as if I could at least understand a little better how Saigyou might have lived under such mujou conditions and found inspiration in all sorts of sources around him. Walking at that moment, almost everything seemed to be beautiful in some manner to me, and though the landscape changed, I found myself okay with that. Saigyou’s poem
“When I think of
this world
all is scattering blossoms,
so where else
might I choose to be?”
shows a great deal of mujou, as he relates the whole world to scattering blossoms, and although this could be taken dispiritedly, I feel that Saigyou’s questioning of where else he might choose to be shows that he was happy with the evanescent world around him, as I was at that moment.

Now approaching the peak of my walk, where the yugure atmosphere was at its best, I enjoyed the mixture of light and shadow constantly progressing around me. My shadow’s length grew longer and longer until I decided it was time to turn back, to enjoy the last fleeting moments of the setting sun. Making my way back, I soon began to go downhill, causing the sun to depart even faster. In the spirit of mujou I decided to run; both just because I felt like it, and also to stop myself from trying to hold onto the last few moments of the sunset. Again, I felt that the view was even more spectacular due to its fleeting nature, but also very tempting to become attached to, as though I ran, viewing the sunset had been my biggest influence for taking the walk.

After sunset, I could truly feel the mystery ascribed to yugure. Now, again in a very mujou way, the whole landscape that I had just travelled seemed changed, and somehow different from before. I was reminded of many of the autumn poems we had read at the sight of a lone black cat, half hidden in dried grass. It was obviously a stray, and in the twilight I could honestly not tell if it was missing an orange eye, or which eye it might be missing. Highly reminded of Basho’s poem
“Crows resting
on a withered branch—
evening in autumn”
because of the same eerie feeling, mujou again invaded my thoughts, as even the poems I connected to on my walk were seemingly mutable; starting off with poems derived from spring imagery, I was now turning to poems inspired by fall sights. Truly yugure was a mujou time period, persuading both the landscape and my thoughts to change in mere instants.

Making my way back, the darkening sky continued to change the path around me, making everything feel a bit more uncertain, darkening the faces of the few people whom I did pass. And for this I was happy of the products of my three hour excursion; now I felt as if it truly had been a good decision to impulsively wander off, some time alone of guilty procrastination had actually forced me to think more into the concept of mujou and the poets and collections that I relate with it. Mujou had brought beauty to the walk, and also a sense of freedom. It made the simple sights I saw more special and even brought me just a hair closer to ancient poets. At that moment, I was content with this ever changing, temporary world, and understood a bit better how it could be such a driving force in both poetry and other kinds of literature. My last thoughts were with one of Issa’s poems, which I think truly captures the feeling of mujou and the wonder that can go along with it.
“A little child
Picked with his fingers
A drop of dew--
And lo, it vanished!”