A star that was ejected from the black hole at the center of our galaxy, five million years ago, was first seen recently, moving at incredible speed. The observation of gamma-ray explosions seven billion light-years away—“the highest-energy light ever seen from celestial sources”—was announced just this year. Our time feels historic; in the realm of […]
As the impeachment inquiry makes clear—again—it is difficult to say that which is so. To say true things colorfully or poetically is harder; comically may be even harder; and directly or briefly the hardest of all. “Simplicity is the final achievement,” Chopin is said to have said. “After one has played a vast quantity of […]
It was a full day of trains and walking to get from an ancient mountain town to the coast, then down to Yokota Air Base, on the western edge of Tokyo. I was meeting one of my oldest friends there, a retired US Army sergeant-major named Frenchy, who was my boss in military diving. We […]
The man who ran the bodega in a back street of Hijiori Onsen served me three cups of coffee, each in a new cup, with new saucer, when nothing else in town was open. It was seven a.m., and I had been up since five. He looked older than I think he was. I told […]
It was a gorgeous morning, cool and sunny, and I would be under conifers much of the day to cross the Natagiri Pass. Basho and Sora had hired a young man for a guide, who wore a short sword and carried an oak walking stick that could no doubt serve as a cudgel, to cross […]
This day’s walk would be nine miles, with an overloaded pack and 2,100 feet of elevation change. Three trains, including the “Peregrine Falcon,” one of Japan’s fastest shinkansen, took me to Naruko Onsen by 10 am. Full of egg-salad sandwich, yogurt, and coffee, I had a tickle of pleasure in my stomach, and a warm […]
At dawn the fishing boats of Matsushima swung on their anchors with the tide. A flock of cormorants, fishing a few yards from shore, panicked as a group, plashed across the water, and took flight. The port smelled of seawater and diesel. I was headed out for another day on the Basho trail, with more […]
Cyclists were lined up at rail crossings, holding clear umbrellas and wearing clear plastic ponchos, during morning rush hour, somewhere in Tōhoku. The train from Sendai pulled in to an open platform with no station sign, and I asked a boy across the aisle if this was Kokufu-Tagajo. He looked up, alarmed, and by instinct […]
“Don’t follow in the footsteps of the old poets, seek what they have sought,” Matsuo Bashō says, in the Hass translation. Too late: I am in Sendai, Japan, to begin walking a segment of Bashō’s Narrow Road. Besides, Bashō was chasing the poet Saigyō and thinking of other poets’ lives and work, as he and […]
Ever wonder what your favorite actors from old TV shows are up to? There is a chance they are down at the Hollywood Show, a fan meet-and-greet at the LAX Westin, as well as in Las Vegas and Chicago. It is in its 40th year. The Show is run by David and Esther Elkouby, owners […]
