I am a bad person only today.

a former nurse in Ofunato, Iwate Prefecture

 

 

After the earthquake of March 11, despite seeing people calling for help from the collapsed house and her sister's house swept up to far away by tsunami, she struggled to head home, worrying about her husband hospitalized with heart disease and animals she kept. She prayed "Please forgive me , God", crying her eyes out. A poet, Mikirou Sasaki lost words when he got a firsthand account from her. From "Listening to Tohoku."

 

October 8, 2015

from “Oriori no Kotoba” by Kiyokazu Washida, The Asahi Shimbun