Classic Poem

As May came to the Kuroshio off Mount Kinka,
the sea suddenly enlarged,
brightened like a tent of blue cellophane.
The waves flowing, glittering, batted their eyes at the midday sun,
their course getting somewhat closer to the land.
The sperm whale, after spouting once, dived again deeply,
put the giant weight of his head on the water;
pleased with this warm current, salt-thick and smooth,
he let his mind loose and indulged in endless thoughts.
That I am not a dolphin, not a grampus,
but a sperm whale,
makes me the happiest thing in the world, the whale thinks.
Ah, you can't beat the present.
The whale looks at nothing but the present.
He always tastes the peak of existence,
he doesn't touch hypotheses, he doesn't get into metaphysics.
Drunk with thoughts resembling drowsy sleep,
the whale senses the unknown land drawing near
and is half afraid, half glad.
Once again he rose up, and into the May sky
raised a full-breath spout, a rainbow.
On the Ojika Peninsula, at Ayukawa Port, the siren is on,
but this massive optimist is utterly unaware of it.