Impressions

My 90-year-old neighbour prayed for me to be safe in Tokyo.

Three hours’ sleep for the woman running the country.
Unannounced smoking areas; maps are as unreliable as Italian and German trains.
So I need to remember. “Remember Kanda Square Hall! Remember the hall!”

In my hometown we’re short on shade.
Zen gardens too, but here nature is never too high-maintenance.

“Enough with the best sellers! Rent your own little library shelf in Jimbocho.”
A four-storey manga bookshop and the girl with the pink t-shirt reading her pink book.

7 A.M., 30 degrees: a young man lies at the bottom of the stairs.
Is he breathing? Where are the Toyoko kids?

“Anto-san! Your order is ready.”

I hide on the balcony with my e-cig.
Crows look at me. They’re from the smoking police, I know.

Cats and dogs in the shop window. People’s little friends.
You run after them, not the other way round.
I speak to a bird standing on my backpack.

A clean city. No trash bins in sight.
A mommy rat and her little ones walk through the smokers at Senso-ji Temple
searching for the smell of the outcast.

Sounds of nature in the Tokyo metro
before you fall asleep
in the women-only carriage.