Sign from Kumano Jinja

why covet your life,
man of firm futility?
why long to become
what i long to escape from:
a raw heart grated
by ugliness close to home;
the temple bells' sound;
that tense, imperfect balance
as the conscience pulls
the soul in two directions;
and to die at last,
after too long an effort,
in acknowledgment
of one's inability
to reconcile them?

could it be the same feeling
as catching a glimpse
of plum blossoms in the snow?
of a young woman
who will come home an old one?
of a thin-spun song,
perched on a simple, strummed chord,
of severed togetherness?