By Kokoro Still
Shimo never lingers long.
It appears before the sun,
covering soil and leaves in a fragile white—
a thin stillness that waits only for morning light.
In that brief pause,
as shimo begins to vanish,
the quiet itself holds a trace of Kokoro.
In Japan, shimo (霜/frost) is one of winter’s quiet markers.
It whitens fields and temple stones; on colder mornings, shimo-bashira (frost columns) rise from the soil and break with a crisp sound under each step.
In haiku, shimo is a winter kigo (seasonal word), a sign of impermanence—white breath on the earth that vanishes as the sun climbs.
It is a whiteness that keeps no record.
A Thin White Over the Earth
At dawn, the earth seems to borrow light.
Every blade of grass, every fallen leaf, is edged with ice crystals.
Shimo is thin—yet it makes the ground feel held in hush, as if a hush had settled there.
When Shimo Breaks
When footsteps press the ground, shimo gives one brief crack.
It is crisp, fleeting—a sound gone the moment it is heard.
The shimo-bashira, tall and delicate, shatter under a single step,
scattering traces of both sound and stillness.
When Light Takes Shimo
Soon, sunlight reaches the soil.
Shimo withdraws, turning into air, as if its only task were to leave a trace of change and go.
What is left is not shimo itself, but the quiet it revealed—
a quiet bearing the trace of Kokoro, the hush that remains.
Shimo does not endure.
It belongs only to the pause between night and morning.
In its vanishing, silence takes form—
and within that silence, Kokoro is perceptible there—as quiet itself.
Featured image: The image was created by AI (ChatGPT)
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