Seasonal Games of the Demons

(♪) What is it that makes the seasons different and causes the rain and snow, the wind and thunder? Edo-period children most certainly wondered about changes in the weather and the seasons. This picture book gives all the answers: the reason the weather changes like it does is because demons are at play in the sky. (♪)

(♪) The thunder demons carry clouds out of the storehouse and give them a good pounding in the mortar. Now they are kneading them in a bamboo basket. Could they be making a thunder cloud? Demons: “Good heavens! This cloud is a tough one!”

(♪) This device is a bellows that sends out the wind. This is what makes the gales roar around the earth. The demons use all manner of techniques to make the wind blow. Sometimes they stand on the side and fan the air, and some of them blow gusts through their bamboo tubes. There are many ways to make the wind. Demon 1: “This high wind has got to be causing all kinds of trouble for the people down there.” Demon 2: “Ah, yes, but look how it fills the sails of that boat! It’s almost flying!”

(♪) Next, to make the rain fall, the demons have a watering can so big it covers the whole sky. From this place and that, they are bringing water to fill the watering can and are letting it out in a drenching downpour. Demon 1: “That’s it, good! Keep it up. Give it more! Faster, now, faster!” Demon 2: “Better not let it rain too long...” Demon Song: “The people down on the ground / think the rain pours endlessly / It is a summer squall / from our watering can.”

(♪) The only night of the year when Cowherd Star (Altair) and Star Weaver (Vega) meet in the sky is July 7th, the night of Tanabata. The other stars, too, celebrate the poignant beauty of the lovers, who people say remind them of kabuki actors Bando Mitsugoro and Iwai Hanshiro. Indeed, one can almost hear someone calling out their names in the night sky, as kabuki fans often do in the theater.

(♪) It’s time to get ready for the evening shower, so the thunder demons climb up on black clouds and beat their thunder drums. GORO GORO GORO. The woman demon, Lightning, will not be left behind. She shines her gleaming mirror toward the earth below and flashes it as she runs around here and there on the cloud. Lightning: “I polished my mirror so well! How brightly it flashes!”

(♪) For some time now, the demons have held back on the rain and down on earth there’s a huge clamor going on about the drought. This will never do, the demons think, and they decide to send down rain mixed with hail. An ancient bespectacled demon fussily directs the operations. “When you mix hail in the raindrops, get it right!” In case you want to know, here is the recipe for hail. It’s just like making little rice crackers. First you flatten the dough and stretch it all out, and next cut it into thin strips. Then you chop the strips TON TON TON into small pieces. It’s exciting, like making rice cakes at year’s end. Demons: “Whew! I’m done in!” “Hey! Let’s take a breather!” Off to the side a demon child begs his mother to give him some of the hail crackers. Children are the same everywhere, aren’t they!

(♪) In August and September when the demons are not quite so busy, they get to work laying in a supply of sleet for the winter. They load sleet in baskets and one by one line them up on shelves. Demon 1: “We’ve got to be careful so the little ones don’t get into it.” Demon 2: “This year’s batch is even-grained and good quality!”

(♪) On the night of the fifteenth of August, the demons got together on a cloud and had a moon-viewing banquet. They put some pampas grass in a vase and made offerings, and then they had a merry time drinking and singing to their hearts’ content. Demon 1: “Ahhh…this is absolute heaven!” Demon 2: “A night of falling stars has its own special charm ….JaJaJa RAN.” Could it be that this song was popular in the sky back then?

(♪) While the demons were doing this and that, winter came. With hoes, chisels, and planes, they crushed the snow mountain into tiny flakes and began to send snow falling over the whole world. Demon 1: “We’ve got a good pile of snow here!” Demon 2: “Start with the tiny flakes—send them down first.” Demon 3: “If it snows a lot, the people down there will surely be happy. They’ll say it’s a sign of a productive year.”

(♪) They put the old rain in a wooden tub, filter it and let it freeze, and then when it becomes snow, they mix it with new snow and send it falling over the earth below. It’s really nothing more than reused rain. Demon 1: “Not bad. We’ve got it just about right.” Demon 2: “Now this is what I’d call first-class snow!” Demon 3: “Get it done before the sun hits it. Get a move on! Hurry up!”

(♪) Today the demons are once more peering down at the earth from the sky and thinking up ways to amuse themselves. The comic poem of the demons: “Snow is falling / Why don’t you rake up / the piles of snow on the ground / and make a mountain of silver.” Of course if they could really do that, they would be wealthy beyond measure!