languisity
what makes a mountain a mountain and a hill a hill
In the distance far,
As yet unseen peaks
Are shrouded in the haze;
Yet I think of a blossom on
The path across the Shiga Mountains.
The path referred to in this 12th century Japanese poem was a popular route for spiritual pilgrims. It was so well-known that the phrase ‘the path across the Shiga Mountains’ became an utamakura—a poetic device in which a place name is used as a geographical allusion. In other words, it’s a sort of shorthand that allowed the poet to suggest all manner of attributes without having to actually list them. Such devices were critically important in classical Japanese poetry, in which the emotional context was often implied rather than directly stated.
McKenzie, in this wonderfully layered photograph, is giving us a sort of visual utamakura. She doesn’t have to tell us anything; we understand—at a very fundamental level—what’s being said. We can look at each successive tumble of mountain and know, without looking down, the photographer’s feet are firmly planted on a similar range. We can look into the distant haze-shrouded peaks and at the same time be acutely aware that McKenzie is, in effect, the blossom on the path.
Blog photograph copyrighted to the photographer and used with permission by utata.org. All photographs used on utata.org are stored on flickr.com and are obtained via the flickr API. Text is copyrighted to the author, greg fallis and is used with permission by utata.org. Please see Show and Share Your Work
