Year-end Presentations of Waka Poems

2015, The Twenty-seventh Year of Heisei

Year-end Presentation of Five Waka Poems by His Majesty the Emperor

The 66th National Arbor Day Festival
With this hoe in hand
Made from the tree which grew from seeds
Sowed by my father
I now plant the seedling
Of the Japanese black pine.
At the Opening Ceremony of the 70th National Sports Festival
A huge man-made whale
Also appeared on the scene
Spouting with vigor
This mass performance opened
The National Sports Festival.
The 35th Convention for the Development of an Abundantly Productive Sea
Flounder fry nurtured
Using the deep seawater
Of Toyama Bay
Together with the people
I release into the sea.
Visiting Kita-harao, Chifuri, and Ohinata districts, settled and developed by returnees from foreign lands after the war, on the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II
How hard were the days
When they cleared and tilled the land
The people tell us
Their faces gentle and mild
As they now speak of those days.
On the approaching Niiname-sai, a ceremony in which new crops are offered to the deities
This year again
From each and every prefecture
Come harvested grains
Glad and grateful I receive
The fruit of their labour.
(Notes to His Majesty's Waka) :

Note to poem 1 :
The late Emperor Showa, His Majesty's father, sowed the seeds of the Japanese cedar,Cryptomeria japonica, on the occasion of the 34th National Arbor Day Festival held in Ishikawa Prefecture in 1983. At the 66th National Arbor Day Festival again held in Ishikawa Prefecture in May this year, His Majesty used the hoe made from the timber from forest-thinning of this cedar to plant the seedling of the Japanese black pine, Pinus thunbergii. In this poem, His Majesty describes the scene.

Note to poem 2 :
Their Majesties the Emperor and the Empress attended the Opening Ceremony of the 70th National Sports Festival held in Wakayama Prefecture in September this year. In this poem, His Majesty describes how He saw, in a pre-ceremony performance, a huge model of a whale brought out into the centre of the stadium, spouting vigorously.

Note to poem 3 :
Their Majesties the Emperor and the Empress visited Toyama Prefecture in October this year to attend the National Convention for the Development of an Abundantly Productive Sea. In this poem His Majesty describes how on that occasion They released into the sea the flounder fry nurtured using the deep seawater of Toyama Bay.

Note to poem 4 :
In this milestone year, the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II, Their Majesties the Emperor and the Empress visited, from June to August, three districts settled and developed by returnees from foreign lands after the war, Kitaharao district in the town of Zao, Miyagi Prefecture, Chifuri district in the town of Nasu, Tochigi Prefecture, and Ohinata district in the town of Karuizawa, Nagano Prefecture. Kitaharao, meaning “Palau of the north,” was settled by those who returned from the South Pacific Island of Palau, which Their Majesties visited in April this year to pay Their respects to the war dead there. In this poem, His Majesty describes how Their Majesties met and conversed with the people who had settled in those districts and heard their experiences.

Note to poem 5 :
At Niiname-sai, first-crop rice and foxtail millet, Setaria italica, presented by farmers from many prefectures are offered to the deities every year. Their Majesties meet and convey Their thanks to the offerers of the crops and those involved in the various prefectures. In this poem His Majesty describes how He felt on receiving the new crops this year as the Niiname-sai approaches.

Niinamesai, which takes place at the Shinkaden, is the most important of all the ritual ceremonies performed at the Imperial Palace Sanctuaries. In this ceremony, His Majesty the Emperor offers the year's new crops to the deities. In addition to the crops offered by the farmers throughout Japan, His Majesty also offers crops which He has grown Himself.

Year-end Presentation of Three Waka Poems by Her Majesty the Empress

On the full restoration of service of the Ishinomaki Line
The spring breeze speeding
Alongside the train as well
This is the morning
The first train of the day
Leaves Onagawa station.
On visiting the island of Pelelieu
Could they be, I wonder,
The souls of the departed
Here in Palau
I watch the silver white terns
Gliding low over the sea.
This year, fifty-three years from YS-11
A passenger jet
Made at home by our people
Taking flight today
Into the clear autumn sky
Into the deep azure.
(Notes to Her Majesty's Waka) :

Note to poem 1 :
The service of JR Ishinomaki Line, badly damaged in the Great East Japan Earthquake, had been partly suspended. Full service was restored in March this year when the railroad between Onagawa station and Urashuku station reopened after four years, and the first train departed from Onagawa station. In this poem, Her Majesty describes how happy She was to hear the news that the service was fully restored.

Note to poem 2 :
Their Majesties the Emperor and the Empress visited the Republic of Palau in April this year to pay Their respects to the war dead. From Akitsushima, a Japan Coast Guard vessel on which They were staying, They took a helicopter to Pelelieu Island, where the Monument of the War Dead in the Western Pacific is located. On Their way there, flying below Them, Her Majesty saw white terns, the same seabirds She noticed at the Suicide Cliff on the island of Saipan in 2005. In this poem, Her Majesty describes how She gazed at the birds, feeling that She may be encountering the souls of the people who had died there.

Note to poem 3 :
In November this year, the first passenger jet made in Japan, the Mitsubishi Regional Jet, or MRJ, succeeded in its test flight. It was the first Japan-made plane in 53 years, since the YS-11, the first propeller-driven passenger aircraft made in Japan after World War II. In this poem, Her Majesty describes how Her thoughts turned to the MRJ flying through the clear blue autumn sky.