Unread postby gman391 » August 20th, 2015, 2:29 am
Well I said that I would post one every day until they were done. So here's the next one, even if no one is reading them.
The Letter from the Crane
Anonymous letter from Toshi Ranbo
My dearest daughter as you read this I have died.
Do not despair of this, for I went to my death willingly as all Samurai should.
For we are the scions of Lady Doji the Fair, the kami of courtesy and soul of our Empire. We can do no less than live up to her. Yet, as it was when my own mother went out on to the field to die, I know how little these words will comfort you.
So indulge your mother one last time, and listen to these words of mine. For they are true, and they are pure.
I remember when I first laid eyes on you in truth. As you found yourself in a new world different from the one inside me that had carried you for nine months. You gave a loud wail, and then composed yourself, looking and searching for me. My heart searched for you and in that moment, I loved you as deep as the ocean.
I remember on your fifth birthday when we brought you to the small room where we had placed all the gifts that our friends and family had given you for your birth. Oh how your face lit up like the sun in joy even as you struggled to be proper and composed just like your mother and father taught you. It was, in a word, adorable.
I remember when we sent you to the academy. You looked up at me with those bright eyes of yours and promised you would make me proud. I wanted to tell you that you already had made me the proudest mother in Rokugan, for how could I ask for another daughter as gifted as you? I like to think you already knew, and that is why I didn't tell you, but in truth I let my fear of giving you too much arrogance hold me back.
I remember how you returned to our home during the winter break of your ninth year. You had met the man that would be your husband you declared. I was surprised even then. Such boldness from my Little Wind, where had she got that from. Your father gently recalled me saying the same thing about him when I was your age. Yet, it was not to be, that boy took you for granted, and you did what I would have done, and educated him on courtesy.
I remember your gempukku, of how you competed with the rest of your classmates for the right to be samurai. The pride I felt when you overcame your old beau to be the winner of the Iaijutsu competition, was only matched by the joy I felt at your dance in the gardens.
I remember you becoming a magistrate and purifying entire cities just by yourself, and of how you were appointed to the Emerald Magistrates, and how proud I was of you my daughter. To rise higher than I ever had, ever could. I'm still proud of that.
I remember how we began to fight, you had no need of the mother who had been like ice to you for your childhood, you had found in your yoriki a man that you could accept marriage to, and a woman you could love. I was unhappy that you denied my choice, and we both said words that even now still sting, like tiny needles in my skin.
I remember the long years where we did as courtesy and tradition demanded of us, but there was no warmth, no joy there. We were Crane and we would not break our careful masks of perfected face for each other. No matter our blood. I remember in the silent night under the moon, letting that mask slip and crying at what I lost in my arrogance. And wondering if you felt the same.
I remember much my daughter, and although we fought and we let our pride come between us. I love you, I always have, but we of the Crane know that love is a blessing and a curse, for it is not the way of the Samurai to show love as the bonge, with open smiles and hugs. For us it was always meant to be a subtle thing, a look there, a gift, a poem, just the gentle wind of truth between us. Yet, my looks were too guarded for you to read, my gifts too poor, and my poetry to foul for you to understand that. I do not blame you, and I do not regret trying to show it, do I wish I had done better? Yes, but that is not our kharma it seems.
We are Crane, we accept nothing less than perfection in ourselves and in our lives. Yet I find that I must share Lady Doji's final admonition to us, do not concern yourself with doing great things, but with right things.
So when your lover stands accused of betrayal and dishonour, as a means to attack you while you serve in the lands of the Isawa. I knew the right thing to do. I cannot, do not approve of you taking a lover besides your husband.
However, she is innocent, for I know that you would not love anyone who did not love Bushido as much as you did. So although I am old, and my skills not as sharp as they once were, I take up the blade for the woman. For I trust you and the tenets of our clan and ourselves hold to kill an innocent is to violate everything we have worked for.
Do not blame yourself my daughter for my death, yes I love you, and for once in my life, I will show it with my actions.
Farewell my Little Wind.
In the frozen woods of Isawa Mori, Kakita Kazeko looked down at the letter again. The last missive of her mother. The rain must be coming down, that was why there were wet spots on the paper. After all, like her mother said, the Crane would never allow their emotional control to fray so much.
Folding the paper away, Kakita Yoriko draws her sword in the same stance she practiced in secret after seeing her mother do it when she was a child.
"Watch me mother, I'll make you proud" she says in silent prayer as the wind blows and she moves.
"My friends, love is better than anger. Hope is better than fear. Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic. And we’ll change the world."
----Jack Layton