Sweet the girl and tender her age,
She's too young for the fire's rage.
But, alas, the law still stands,
And punishment for her crime demands.
Little Oshichi, that greengrocer girl,
Her hands, restrain; and hair, unfurl.
She stands upright against the stake,
Weeping as she regrets her mistake.
She had fallen in love with a page,
While a fire had roared and raged.
As her house was burnt away,
Love, within her heart, gave way.
Entranced, enraptured, and captured with him,
Oshichi went forth on a fanciful whim.
Believing that it would bring them together,
She struck a flint and started a fire.
A clanging tocsin pierced the night,
"Me-gumi, hark! There's a fire to fight!"
A throng of ***** steeplejack boys
Rush to the scene with swaggering poise.
Oshichi now gazed in horror, aghast,
Watching as the fire spread fast–
Her dream of meeting her youthful lover
Set ablaze with burning desire.
Arrested, tried, and sentenced to suffer,
The judge, kind sir, tried his best to save her.
"Are you not 15?" he asked, worriedly.
"I'm 16, my lord," she answered meekly.
Bewildered and anxious, he asked yet again,
"Surely you're 15, young one, dear saint?"
She bowed her head and shed a tear.
"No... I'm 16," she answered with fear.
Cursing his fate, the judge had no choice.
He gave his sentence with a downcast voice:
"Yaoya Oshichi–what girl so tender–
Shall be burnt an arson offender."
Bound and burnt for want of love,
Oshichi lifts her gaze above.
Weeping as her smoke ascends,
She cries to heaven, its mercy lend.
At last, Oshichi succumbs to the fire,
Consumed by passion borne of desire.
Sweet the girl and bitter the flame,
As her lover cries out her name.
A dramatization of the legend of Yaoya Oshichi.
*Me-gumi: one of the 48 fire brigades serving Edo (Tokyo).
