Last Week, or 枕木

I mentioned in my November Golf Report that I had turned my attentions to other things after such an astounding victory. Trainspotting. Songwriting. Reflections on female pulchritude. What followed was some despiteous concern from my readers, aspersions that my normal vocabulary may not be suitable for songwriting. “Balderdash!,” I thought, “I’ll write a song just to show I can.”

I must admit that my attempt at songwriting, no matter that I put myself in salubrious places likely to be conducive to the flowing of lyrics from my pen, such as at Okayama’s beautiful Korakuen above, turned out to be rather more difficult than I thought. I traveled all around Japan, tried the local delicacies at every stop, and racked my mind for lyrics. I set out to write a song called Last Week, and all I could come up with is this:

In Manila is a trophy/grand reward for my victory/but when it comes to songwriting/my mind is fixed on 枕木.

Clearly the travel has been a bit much recently. 枕木 (makuragi) means railroad tie, in Japanese, and whether it is the fact that makuragi rhymes with trophy and victory, or that I have been traveling by train every day this week, or that I enjoy knowing the word makuragi, I can’t say. But I’m not going to do well at songwriting if I mix languages, so I give up on that. Reflecting on female pulchritude is much more pleasant. As is contemplating the massive size of the trophy I won last month.

So I confine myself now to listening to fine songwriting, such as this stanza from Townes Van Zandt:

In the night forlorn the morning’s born
And the morning shines with the lights of love
You will miss sunrise if you close your eyes
That would break my heart in two