Laughing Yamamba

before the bullet trains stopped running at midnight,
while famous American celebrities advertised coffee
on the television screens of skyscrapers
overlooking the street’s deadweight of bodies;

while, managed by the street light and a song,
businessmen and silent bicycles like zombies
stopped in at first-floor sushi bars;

the Yamamba girls stand tall, in platform shoes,
with their dark skin and light hair and makeup,
the great rebels of their culture,
they speak loudly, even on the bursting trains.

far from this teeming island's isolation,
far after the bomb cracked Hiroshima,
now, in this city, the Yamamba girls
fill the air with laughter.