was a Japan

Japan

Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

ese philosophy student and poet

Poet

A poet is a person who writes poetry. A poet's work can be literal, meaning that his work is derived from a specific event, or metaphorical, meaning that his work can take on many meanings and forms. Poets have existed since antiquity, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary...

, largely remembered due to his farewell poem.

Fujimura was born in Hokkaidō

Hokkaido

, formerly known as Ezo, Yezo, Yeso, or Yesso, is Japan's second largest island; it is also the largest and northernmost of Japan's 47 prefectural-level subdivisions. The Tsugaru Strait separates Hokkaido from Honshu, although the two islands are connected by the underwater railway Seikan Tunnel...

. His grandfather was a former samurai

Samurai

is the term for the military nobility of pre-industrial Japan. According to translator William Scott Wilson: "In Chinese, the character 侍 was originally a verb meaning to wait upon or accompany a person in the upper ranks of society, and this is also true of the original term in Japanese, saburau...

 of the Morioka Domain

Morioka Domain

The was a han or feudal domain that encompasses present-day the middle-northern part of Iwate Prefecture and eastern part of Aomori Prefecture. It is sometimes colloquially called . The domain was tozama daimyo and was governed by the Satake clan. Its income was 100,000...

, and his father relocated to Hokkaidō after the Meiji Restoration

Meiji Restoration

The , also known as the Meiji Ishin, Revolution, Reform or Renewal, was a chain of events that restored imperial rule to Japan in 1868...

 as a director of the forerunner of Hokkaido Bank

Hokkaido Bank

Hokkaido Bank is a Japanese bank that is headquartered in Sapporo, Hokkaidō. The Hokkaido Bank is a subsidiary of the Hokuhoku Financial Group as a result of a merger with the Hokuriku Bank on September 1, 2004...

. Fujimura graduated from middle school in Sapporo, and then related to Tokyo

Tokyo

, ; officially , is one of the 47 prefectures of Japan. Tokyo is the capital of Japan, the center of the Greater Tokyo Area, and the largest metropolitan area of Japan. It is the seat of the Japanese government and the Imperial Palace, and the home of the Japanese Imperial Family...

 where he attended a preparatory school for entry into Tokyo Imperial University

University of Tokyo

, abbreviated as , is a major research university located in Tokyo, Japan. The University has 10 faculties with a total of around 30,000 students, 2,100 of whom are foreign. Its five campuses are in Hongō, Komaba, Kashiwa, Shirokane and Nakano. It is considered to be the most prestigious university...

.

Fujimura became distraught when rejected by Tamiko, the eldest daughter of Kikuchi Dairoku

Kikuchi Dairoku

Baron was a mathematician, educator, and educational administrator in Meiji period Japan.-Kikuchi's life and career:Kikuchi was born in Edo , as the second son of Mitsukuri Shuhei...

 in favor of Tatsukichi Minobe, whom she later married. He travelled to Kegon Falls

Kegon Falls

are located at Lake Chūzenji in Nikkō National Park near the city of Nikkō, Tochigi Prefecture, Japan. The falls were formed when the Daiya River was rerouted by lava flows...

 in Nikko

Nikko, Tochigi

is a city in the mountains of Tochigi Prefecture, Japan. Approximately 140 km north of Tokyo and 35 km west of Utsunomiya, the capital of Tochigi Prefecture, it is a popular destination for Japanese and international tourists...

, a famed scenic area, and wrote his farewell poem directly on the trunk of a tree before committing suicide. The story was soon sensationalized in contemporary newspapers, and was commented upon by the famed writer Natsume Sōseki

Natsume Soseki

, born ', is widely considered to be the foremost Japanese novelist of the Meiji period . He is best known for his novels Kokoro, Botchan, I Am a Cat and his unfinished work Light and Darkness. He was also a scholar of British literature and composer of haiku, Chinese-style poetry, and fairy tales...

, the English teacher at Fujimura's high school. Later he wrote on his death in Kusamakura

Kusamakura (novel)

is a Japanese novel published in 1906 by Natsume Sōseki. It tells the story of an artist who retreats to the mountains where he stays at a remote, almost deserted hotel...

. His grave is at Aoyama Cemetery in Tokyo.

The poem read:

Delicate line between heaven and earth…

The calm of the ages,

all the world’s worth.

Such minuscule measure,

while we think it so grand…

Just five specks of smallness,

This soft quiet land.

So frail and so fleeting,

in the end you will see

Simple dreams were Horatio

Horatio (character)

Horatio is a character from William Shakespeare's play Hamlet. A friend of Prince Hamlet from Wittenberg University, Horatio's origins are unknown, though he is evidently poor and was present on the battlefield when Hamlet's father defeated 'the ambitious Norway'...

’s philosophy.



For all the truth,

all creation,

all secrets of yore

Can be told in an instant,

by then they’re no more.



Ah, The Unexplainable

All worries unsettled,

heartache unresolved…

All questions unanswered,

with death, shall be solved.



We already teeter,

this sheer cliff so high.

When we fall to corruption,

insecurities die.



To end is to start;

to surrender is to know.



Despair and depression,

together they grow.

Hope shall meet hopeless

when there’s nowhere to go.