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Maria Meza
Ms. LaPointe
Comp. II Hon.
30 February 2015
Poetry Analysis: “My Dear Silent One, My Indigo Mist”
“Your desire was to let me live” (Nagase 31). The poem “My Dear Silent One, My
Indigo Mist” is by Kyoko Nagase, a famous Japanese modern poet. She went to “the same
kindergarten as Chuya Nakahara”, another famous Japanese modern poet” (Yotsumoto). She
uses her poems to represent how she feels about herself. She lived her life a wife, a farmer, and a
mother (Yotsumoto). In this poem she calls herself “a useless woman” showing that she regrets
not being able to do more and be with her family more than what she did because all she did was
“knead some malleable and familiar mud” (Nagase 22, 25). Kyoko Nagase used a sad tone in this
poem to show how she regrets not having spent more time with her husband, who passed away.
The author also used the indigo mist as a metaphor to represent her husband. Indigo is a dark
blue-purple color. The color the author used to describe the mist, indigo, is used as a symbol to
describe her husband as being by her side eternally and faithfully based on hanakotoba, or
Japanese flower-language color interpretations.
Primarily, the indigo mist in the poem is an implied metaphor that the author uses to
represent her deceased husband. A metaphor is usually an object that is used in literature to
describe something else by comparing the two things, and stating that they are the same thing.
The metaphor in this poem is when the author ends the poem with “you my indigo mist,” and
(Nagase 36). This is an implied metaphor because she is indirectly stating that her deceased
husband is an indigo mist. The metaphor in this poem shows that one does not realize that
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something is gone until it is gone, but the presence of that lost object still remains. At the
beginning of the poem, the author starts writing about a “dear one” who “has gone into the earth”
or in other words died (Nagase 1). This shows that the person she holds dear is dead. She also
describes this person, as strangely still being by her side even though he is no there when she
wrote “yet, strangely, I feel you right next to me” (Nagase 12). His presence is like a mist
because she feels like he is there, but he is not because this “dear” person has died. It is inferred
that it is her husband who died because she declares in the poem that she was “a bad wife” to
him (Nagase 31). She also states that she was too busy in her life thinking about other things
(Nagase 33). By using the metaphor the author is trying to explain that when something dear, is
gone you cannot completely accept the truth that it is gone because one will still feel like it is
there even though one knows that it is not. She paid little attention to her husband, and she is
lamenting having done so.
The color the author uses is a symbol to describe how she feels about, the presence of her
husband, the mist. A symbol is usually an object used to describe an intangible idea of a specific
physical object. Using hanakotoba, one can better understand the decision why she chose the
color indigo, a type of bluish purple. Hanakotoba is a common Japanese way of giving a
meaning to certain flowers and their colors. Generalizing the meanings of indigo flowers, indigo
usually represents loyalty, pride, farewell, and gratitude, and true love1 (Maxwell; Spacey). The
author describes her husband with these qualities throughout the poem. He is loyal because he
does not leave her, when she asks “you are looking over me, aren’t you?”(Nagase 32). She also
identifies her husband with the male quality of pride, when she writes: “But a man in this world/
1
Hydrangeas represent pride, forget- me- not flowers represent true love, Iris flowers represent
loyalty, and sweet peas represent good bye (Maxwell; Spacey).
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doesn’t even dream of apologizing to his wife for his absence” (Nagase 19-20). She is stating
that men are too prideful to apologize to their wives for being absent. Her husband is dead, and
has physically left her, thus indigo symbolizes her husband’s loyalty after death. It can be seen
when she comments: “Not wanting to distract me, you were watching me from a distance / that
was your love in indigo color” (Nagase 7-8).
Other than the meaning behind why the author chose the color indigo, the words the
author uses for herself and her husband give the poem a sad and regretful tone. Tone is the
feeling a literary work conveys through word choice, coming from the author’s own feelings.
She uses a sad tone because it reinforces the meaning of the poem. She has realized that she did
not treasure her husband enough when he was alive. Now that her husband is gone, she is
justifying trying to have her time alone instead of spending her time with him, when she
mentions “I, who write poetry, always tried to be by myself / my heart somehow drifted to
distant dreams” (Nagase 4, 18) . After these stanzas the author takes the blame for her husband’s
loneliness. The author also writes in a sad tone when she exclaims: “Please be with me here for
real – / saying that makes my tears flow of their own accord” (Nagase 13-14). She is sad now
that her husband is dead, and she did not pay more attention to him; that makes her cry. The
author uses this tone when she mentions the words “misfit”, “lonely”, “heartless”, “tears”,
“please”, and “sorry”. The author wishes to be back with her husband (Nagase 13, 14, 16, 23, 25,
34,). Her desperate longing can be felt when she announced “Please be with me here for real –
“(Nagase 13).
In conclusion, this poem shows how one should value important and dear things in life,
because they are not going to last forever. One will only realize what they have until it is gone.
This is the aspect of the poem that I enjoyed the most, along with its cultural color symbolism.
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The author clearly conveyed and expressed her emotions throughout this poem, with the use of
literary devices. Her sorrowful tone expresses the idea that she could have been a better wife to
her “indigo mist” who is watching her at a distance (Nagase 36).
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Works cited
Maxwell, Mandy. “Hanakotoba: The Japanese Language of Flowers.” Flower Shop Network. 21
Oct. 2010. Web. 29 Mar. 2015
Nagase, Kiyoko. “My Dear Silent One, My Indigo Mist.” Poetry International Rotterdam. Trans.
Takako Lento. 2009. Web. 29 Mar. 2015.
Spacey, John. “17 Japanese Flower Meanings.” Japanese Talk. 27 Feb 2015. Web. 29 Mar.
2015.
Yotsumoto, Yasuhiro. Kiyoko Nagase. “Poetry International Rotterdam.” 1 Oct. 2009. Web. 29
Mar. 2015.
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http://www.flowershopnetwork.com/blog/hanakotoba-japanese-flowers/
http://www.japan-talk.com/jt/new/17-Japanese-flower-meanings