#beautyofwaste
by Shikiyu
A seed sprouts,
a flower blooms,
sways in the wind,
and eventually falls.
Like the life of a flower,
we are born into this world,
given the time called “life,”
and live until we’ve spent it all.
Each of us dreams of an ideal future,
and walks at our own pace.
Then someone said,
“In this short life,
I just don’t want to waste it.”
My heart skipped a beat.
To someone who says that,
I must look terribly lazy.
Doing things that bring no results,
things with no clear purpose—
those little detours
that stir my curiosity.
I love them all.
So I look away and say,
“At least, I made you pause for a moment, didn’t I?”
This world is full of things
that seem useless.
It’s a hard time to live in.
A little detour won’t hurt, right?
And though I take too many myself,
if something “useless” moves your heart,
then maybe it was never useless at all.
Like a child
who finds wonder in an ordinary stone.
Like staring at the sky all day,
searching for the color
between blue and red.
Silly stories that make us laugh,
failures that lead nowhere—
The world is overflowing
with such “usefulless” things,
glistening like soft jewels,
quietly calling to us.
At the end of life,
what we remember
might just be those things.
So I’ll say this:
Maybe the word “useless” exists
because such things are essential—
maybe it means
we can’t live without them.
In Japan, the word “mudá” can be divided into two parts.
Each part holds meaning: “mu” (nothing) and “da” (no good).
But when you look at it differently,
it can also be read as “something that must not be lost.”
Oct 29, 2025
Oct 29, 2025 at 12:42 AM UTC