Uta by Uta Tanabe

There must have been a self I wanted to become.

There must have been a goal I wished for more strongly than anyone else.
But slowly, they turned into ideals,

then daydreams,

then illusions,

and at last — into a dream.

And I rested in the kindness of abstraction.

Experiences and memories stirred me,

and the shifting seasons smoothed me out.

Something vague began to bloom within me,

quietly filling every corner, without a sound.

Passing time cut into my body, sharp and clean.

Before I knew it, I had become about half of who I used to be.

And for the missing part of my shadow,

I pretended not to notice.

I had turned twenty-one.

I still liked my coffee — Colombian, French roast.

Even when I couldn’t find it,

I carried the golden ratio of my own blend inside me.

Melodies and poems still drove me to chase my shadow,

but death no longer hid at the far end of life.

I had lost sight of where things began.

Who was I, and what had I been trying to do?

There was so much space in this world —

and yet, I couldn’t seem to find even a small,

quiet corner that would take me in.

But one thing is certain:

I have survived.

Let the tangled background remain as it is.

Since I am still here,

there must be something left for me to do.

Perhaps it is simply this —

to keep on staying,

as properly as I can,

even if I never manage to do things perfectly.

I will untie the dream left hanging in that old room,

breath by breath,

and say goodbye to the person I was yesterday.

“It is poetry that seeds itself in the human heart,

and becomes countless leaves of words.

Without exerting strength, it moves Heaven and Earth;

unseen gods are stirred to feeling,

and even the fiercest warriors are softened by it.”

— Kokin Wakashū (Kana Preface)

Nice to meet you.

My name is Uta —

which means both song and poem.

Uta Tanabe is a 20-year-old multi-talented musician, audio engineer, multi-instrumentalist, and graphic designer from Japan.