JISATSU MORI
A man stands at the entrance of the suicide forest in Yamanashi, Japan. He is at the end of his rope. He is hopeless. He is ashamed of a life that has fallen short of his hopes and dreams. He is ashamed of what he has become. He is ashamed of what he has not become. He thinks of his children. He thinks of his ex wife, the mother of his children. He thinks of his dying father. He remembers his long dead mother. He thinks how upset and disappointed she would be if he continued further into the forest and succeeded in what he intended to do. She used to call him "chottoshita maho" or "little magic" in Japanese. There was nothing magical in what he was about to do. Nothing magical at all.
The air in this place smelled like death. And there was something about the forest that beckoned you in. A dark force. A dark energy. It pulled at you. It pulled at you to step forward. Step within and put an end to all that you know. Step within and become the darkness. End your life. End your existence.
He saw his children's faces. He saw Daisuki at 3 years old, walking and stumbling across the kitchen floor. He remembered Hikaru being born. The look on his ex wifes face as she held her first born "Hiki", as they liked to call him. What would their mother tell them when they asked where their daddy was? When they asked, "What happened to father? Is he ever coming back?"
It was late afternoon, approaching evening. The wind rustled through the trees, blowing the rotting death smell all around the Japanese mountain air. And just then, the sun splintered through the limbs and branches of the trees at the edge of the suicide forest. This was called komo rebi in Japanese. There was no English word for it. No translation for such rare beauty. When you viewed it, though, the Japanese believed strongly that in these moments you were touched by a higher force. And that you were blessed to witness them. As the rays of the sun split the trees, the man could hear a faint song on the wind. As he paid more attention and opened his ears, tuning out the sound of the rustling trees and the birds and the silent voices beckoning him to "Come within. Step further. End it all. You have no more to live for", he realized he knew the song. It was an old song that his mother used to sing to him. "Shiratori no uta" He was just a child when she used to sing it for him. He thought again of his children. He pictured Daisuki crying and weeping uncontrollably about his long lost father. He thought again about Hikaru. Unable to go on with life without his father. Would he too end up standing where his father stood now?
The man stepped back-back from the treeline, back from the signs asking one to turn back. Asking one to reconsider and choose life, back from the beckoning power of the ancient ghost voices telling him to end it all. He turned around and began walking back from where he came. A small grin came over his aging Japanese visage. He would not be returning here again. Not in this life. Not ever.