SHISAN:  LASER AURORAS
........COMMENTARY - by Conrad Didiodato, CA
   

I’d like to consider the Shisan: “Laser Auroras” under the following four categories: (a) renku as collocation of distinctive impressions and moods; (b) the “link” and “shift” principles of renku composition; (c) the kaleidoscope (aesthetically pleasing) effect of “mirrored” folio verse stanzas; and (d) the force of the whole renku.

A) Renku as collocation of distinctive impressions and moods

The structured yet spontaneous impression-gathering of the renku presents brilliantly contrasting sides of spring season: the title of the shisan is arresting, with the meteorological phenomenon of aurora “laser” suggesting spring’s invisible yet pervasive (perhaps deadly) qualities. Rays in night sky, though without power to materially affect seasons, nonetheless present the bold, colourful artifice of sun’s power as a force to be reckoned with. Laser auroras are emblematic of meridian radiance and bold titanic strength at a far remove from tangible events. The avalanches in the next verse attest the doubly vested majesty of this season of the year: rise in temperatures may actually account for disasters like avalanches but their colourful marker in the night sky, though causally distant from nature, gives this event almost mythical stature in the renku as almost suggesting a medieval notion of The structured yet spontaneous impression-gathering of the renku presents celestial influences. The leader-student survived by possessing Herculean powers, to be sure, as if the volcano had been a labour freely undertaken. The reader is also subtly drawn to the more tragic story of the philosopher Empedokles on Aetna whose suicide is perhaps a reminder of the deathly grip of real as opposed to mythical avalanches and volcanoes. The cold (“avalanches”) and hot (“volcanoes”) balanced images give place and character both mythical and mortal paradigms within which the renku is free to tell either the mythical or real the story of protagonist and nature.

B) The “link” and “shift” principles of renku composition

The “link” and “shift” principles of renku verse progression work wonderfully as a compositional tool in the shisan’s second folio: (a) how endearingly the lamp’s “after-images”, warm and glowing, provide comfort for the teddy-bear sleeper in the opening verse. Yet the thematic shift from avalanche survivors is obvious: though “linkage by reflection” is clear in the connection of a comforting summer moon to a sleeping child’s dreams, the heroism of the leader-student imperiled by real natural disasters now gives place to the relative comfort and security of airplane travel thousands of feet above the earth. Heroism below is very different from that of traveling by air. The shift from land-based to air-based danger is clear. After-images given off by a lamp may also suggest the more tenuous ethereal qualities of every child’s dreams, though, as I’ve already suggested, it is primarily to ideas of comforting warmth ( and teddy-bear security) that flickering images of summer lead the reader of renku here. Abstracted qualities of “summer moon”—the very pleasantness of the season itself—have  provided comfort to a sleeping infant as cradling arms in which renkujin may be implying that all air passengers can find peace and security. However the presence of the old man in the final verse may make problematical the link to a sleeping child “asleep in the plane”.  The opening verse is a fragment whose subject is missing (though presumably understood): for could it be the tragic senility of old age reflecting on first love? The shift is announced in terms of contrasting ages of the sleeper (reveur). And what a wonderful way to link its mirror image to the preceding “after-images/of an acetylene lamp”. Or perhaps we’ve been transported down below to witness a lonely old man reliving the first blush of youth in his bathroom mirror. What contrast (though twice removed: once in age, another in physical location) between a child’s dream and that of all second childhood.

C) The kaleidoscope (aesthetically pleasing) effect of “mirrored” folio verse stanzas

And then there’s the lovely kaleidoscope effect of mirrored “folio” stanzas: if we look at the third folio, we see the 3-2-3 line verse pattern inverted to the 2-3-2 of the fourth folio. What is the poetic import of mirrored verses? It hangs like an elegant necklace around lady renku. It is aesthetically pleasing. Alternating verse patterns can prevent the dull repetitive pattern of narrative poetry: appearing like shining facets of a diamond as the hand turns it slowly in the light. This macro-“shift” in stanza structure almost seems to mirror that finer, more subtle nuancing of meaning that operates on the shisan’s micro level.

D) The force of the whole renku

The effect of the whole is, in my estimation, to reflect in its prismed form the entire spectra of reflections, descriptions and moods for which the “renku” gem seems to have been purposely crafted.

Read the SHISAN: LASER AURORAS

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