The history is told translated in brochures.
Castle walls reconstructed. Insides redesigned.
The old foreman Murasawa retained.
He looks across, a face of anger or agony
scabbard lofted defiantly impotent
frozen in brass.
The war in Osaka is a thousand years done.
So too is the urgency. Sandbags heaped
waiting for workers who heed no whip.
Whose motivation holds only
by spiderweb threads of duty
they can neither see or explain but
are helpless not to be pulled along by.
They take pride in the deeds of the dead.
Of those in graves that might have been their own
if there were any noble wars or ever were.
The only fight left is to keep the memory alive
that their ancestors had greatness.
Cup this candle with their hands
so that somewhere down the line of their kin
this spark may ignite once more.
*
AJG
