To us, a sun is not quite a sun unless it's 'radiant,' and a spring not quite a spring unless it is 'limpid.' Here to place adjectives would be so rude as leaving price tags on purchases. Japanese poetry never modifies. There is a way of saying boat, rock, mist, frog, crow, hail, heron, chrysanthemum, that includes them all.

Newspapers have been filled recently with the story of a man from Nagoya. The woman he loved died last year and he'd drowned himself in work, Japanese-style, like a madman. It seems he even made an important discovery in electronics. And then, in the month of May, he killed himself. They say he could not stand to hear the word 'spring.'

-Chris Marker, Sans Soleil