Those Happy Moments are Forever Gone

As I wrote, “Ko-jin” reminded me of my childhood, despite a big gap of years. When I was perhaps at a kindergarten age, my mother would take me to a place where goldenrods (キリン草) were blooming as far as my eye could see. To reach there, we walked through the neighbourhood shrine and up the slope eastwards. Also, she would point at a few fire-red lycorises (彼岸花, 曼珠沙華), which could be seen on a bank of the stream that crosses the main street. We would look at them from the small stone bridge. Such nice memories. Mother and son, happily together. I deeply miss those rare moments. But they are forever gone… Forever. Mother, are you okay?