ソテツはぼくの名前

右肩かすめてすれ違ったあの子はそうだ

少し長めのプリーツで三つ折り白靴下に

手持ち革鞄の古風なセーラー服の中学校

セーターはすそが丸まって内側に巻き込まれてる

濃紺のセーラーカラーはちいさめ

リボンは結び目まんまるで結ぶ規則

同級生のはずなのにぼくはいま教育実習を終えて大学四年で

あの子は中学生だった

すぐ振り返って確認しても中学生のままだった

駅にむかう視線の先

横顔は革靴の音がコマ送りするたび後ろ姿に変わって

大通りを真っすぐ歩いていった

そのまま歩いた

             どんどん歩いていくと

             うさぎちゃんに会いました

             うさぎちゃんこんにちは

             うさぎちゃんさようなら

             またどんどん歩いていくと

             レイちゃんに会いました

             レイちゃんこんにちは

             レイちゃんさようなら

             またどんどん歩いていくと

という話を寝るまえ父がしてくれた

             ちがう

             もっと長い話して

というと長い長いヘビの話になり

             そうじゃない

というと長い長い長いロープになり、最後は

             どんどん歩いていく

話になる

長いヘビはただのヘビで長いロープもただのロープだけど

どんどん歩いていくのはぼくだ

それもただのぼくではなくどんどん歩いて

歩き続けて止まることがない

             ウサギは路地へ駆けてった

             地面に弧を描いて工場むかって跳ねた

             ウサギ!

             おじに言う

             振り返るとおじは建物だった

             建物の横のオリに仲間のウサギがいた

             ワラに埋もれてオリの隙間から突っ込まれた雑草を食べて

             そばのソテツには目もくれなかった

             ソテツは空に向けて棘を突き刺す

             「ウサギはそれで血を出してたのかもな。」

             建物のおじが言う

             ウサギが駆ける

             群生してる建物の間を抜けて描く白い弧

「ぼくならソテツに水をあまりあげずに髪の毛くらい細くなるま

でほっとく。そうしてウサギに刺さらないようになったらいい。

ソテツは新しい種として認められ、ぼくの名前がつく。」

Sago is My Name

This poem is from Done Being Nurtured (Spite Press, July 2026) translated by Corey Wakeling.

That’s how the kid who brushed against my right shoulder was as they passed by me

A slightly oversized pleated skirt with thrice-folded white socks

a leather bag carried by hand for that secondary school with the old-fashioned sailor suit uniform

The sweater had its trim rolled up inwardly, leaving the hem in a bulge

The navy-blue sailor-suit collar was a smaller type

with a regulation knot in a circular hoop-style ribbon

We should’ve been classmates, however, but I am a fourth-year university student who has

finished teacher training, and she was a secondary school student.

Even looking back soon after we passed one another, she was as she was, a secondary schooler.

The gaze confronted with the station ahead

her profile changed into a rear view, as each frame changes with the sound of leather shoes

walking straight along the main road just as she was, walking

             and as you continued to walk

             you met Usagi-chan

             Hello, Usagi-chan

             Goodbye, Usagi-chan

             Then, as she was walking further still

             she met Rei-chan

             Hello, Rei-chan

             Goodbye, Rei-chan

             Then, when she walked some more—

   was the story Dad read to me before I went to sleep

     That’s not right

     Tell me a longer story

and so, a much, much longer tale of the snake it became—

       That’s not it

—and so it turned into a much, much, much longer rope, until last of all

     she continued to walk further

—is what becomes the story

although the long snake is just an ordinary snake and the long rope is just an ordinary rope

The one continuing to walk further is me

Even then, I keep walking, so it can’t be an ordinary me

I do not stop as I continue to walk

             The Rabbit, Usagi, raced to the alleyway

             marked an arc shape in the earth, turned to the plant, and bounded off

             Rabbit!

             I said to an uncle

             Looking back, my uncle was a building

             There in a cage at the side of the building was our friend the Rabbit

             chewing on weeds stuck into gaps in the cage buried under straw

             They didn’t take one look at the sago there by their side

             A sago thrusts its prickles out, skyward

              ‘You know, I think that might be when the Rabbit bled,’

             said the building man.

             The Rabbit flees

             slipping through the space between clustered buildings, white arcs marked

‘In my case, by not giving it any water; I leave the sago to wither as thin as a thread of hair.

That way, it’s better for the Rabbit; it won’t get stabbed by the sago, then.

The sago is identified as a new species, then named—after me.’