Tuesday 26 February 2013

Accidental poetry

Recently, I was using an online Japanese-English dictionary, looking up meanings for the character "zan" 残. I was going through all the different uses that this character had when I noticed that the first few dozen examples seemed to have a poetic quality to them. Now, I'm no expert, but I thought it was worth sharing. So, with minimum editing from me (the original page is here), I present to you a piece of accidental poetry that I call

Definitions of the character "残"

Alas,
Bad luck.
Don't let it get to you.
Game over.
I'm sorry to hear that.
That sucks.
That's too bad.
What a bummer.
You got to be kidding me!

Remaining snow
An incidental image
Residual quantity
Lingering summer heat
Not at all
Remains

The ruin of a ship
A residuary bequest
Leave place for...
Overtime pay
A ledger balance
Insensate brutality
Leave an impression
Eat every bit
Remain behind
A barbaric punishment
A credit balance
To a man
Nobody left on base

1 comment:

stenote said...

Interesting poetry... May I share a haiku for Vincent van Gogh in https://youtu.be/ZmHLNeBOT_g