K, by Haruki Murakami
my translation of the twenty-seventh story (of 99) of 夢で会いましょう [Meet Me in a Dream] by Haruki Murakami and Shigesato Itoi, not guaranteed to be accurate. see the intro post to read more!
K: the eleventh letter of the alphabet.
Used in a sentence: That morning K woke from troubled dreams to find himself transformed into a door mat.
That morning K woke from troubled dreams to find himself transformed into a door mat.
What’s happened to me? he thought. Of all things, I’ve become a door mat?
The first to see his new form was a co-worker.
Is this some practical joke? his co-worker asked. Are you planning some prank for the Christmas party?
No, unfortunately not. It’s real, was K’s reply.
Well, ok. No need to yuck your yum, I guess. By the way, did you fill out your transformation intakes?
Transformation intakes?
Forms. Oh man, you’ll have to. Your tax bracket’s gotta change. Your base deduction shrinks by, oh what is it, ten percent I think for door mats.
Really?
Yep, unfortunately so. If only you’d become an ironing board. They only lose like three percent of it.
The next person K spoke to was a friend, a literary critic.
Hey, I can’t help but notice, this friend asked. Are you a door mat?
Yes, indeed, I am, was K’s reply.
You can’t be serious.
Wipe your feet.
His friend did just that: he wiped his feet across K’s surface. That was that: established fact.
Anyways, why a doormat? his friend asked.
It’s not my fault.
Not your fault? That feels more Camus than Kafka.
The last person to see him was his girlfriend, who worked in publishing. She tripped over the door mat, which was him, while stepping out. She hit her head against the mailbox.
Oh, I’m sorry, she said. I’ve been up all night putting finishing touches on a manuscript. They shifted the table of contents on me last minute. Anyways, why are you a door mat?
A total escape from life, was K’s reply.
What a pity. Is there anything I can do. Might true love’s kiss transform you back?
I’ve already tried that.
Ha ha. Funny.
Anyways, that’s such a backwards thought. Are we the British? Leave me at the door of some all-girls dormitory, if you must. That the only help I can afford.
Seems simple enough. If I do, will I inherit your cassette deck?
Sure, of course.
Your Boz Scaggs and Paul David records?
I won’t need ‘em.
I’ve always liked those Hawaiian shirts you have.
Well now they’re those Hawaiian shirts that you have.
And of course, I can borrow your car…
Now and then you’ll have to change the oil in it. Oh, and get the clutch checked. It’s been making this terrible noise.
You can count on me.
So K lived happily then on ever after as the door mat at a woman’s boarding house. No office, no more literature, no publishing at all. Not so bad an ending, come to think of it.
translator's note: at some event or another i jokingly called this book a collection of literary shitposts (might have even wrote it elsewhere on this blog), and nowhere is this truer than this little lark. a kafka parody that all the sudden loses interest in itself. a structure for half-assed little jokes. i love it. i did my best to keep a sort of full indifferent tone
Blueberry Ice Cream, by Haruki Murakami
my translation of the seventy-eighth story (out of 99) of 夢で会いましょう [Meet Me in a Dream] by Haruki Murakami and Shigesato Itoi, not guaranteed to be accurate. see the intro post to read more!
I want blueberry ice cream, my girlfriend said at 2AM.
What makes a woman think of such a thing at such an hour? I found myself, conversely, thinking of Xie Jishi in Manchuria at the end of the war, who knows quite why. I pulled a white shirt on anyway, and called a car.
Take me somewhere with blueberry ice cream, I told the cabbie. Then I let my eyes shut with a yawn.
Fifteen minutes later we reached an unfamiliar street, beneath the façade of an unfamiliar building. It was ancient-looking and three stories, and its roof flew unfamiliar flags.
So this place has blueberry ice cream? I asked the driver.
Why else would I drive you here? he said.
The perfect reply, dramaturgically speaking. I paid then went inside.
The receptionist there couldn’t have been a day past twenty. She sat behind her desk completely idly, yet she appeared overwhelmed.
Do you carry blueberry ice cream? I asked.
Annoyed, face seeming in fact to say aloud why now of any hour?, she handed me a clean, pastel-tone form.
Name and address, she said. And then door 3.
I borrowed a pencil and filled in my name and address. Door 3 was up a coffin-like wooden step. Behind it, at at desk so large it could have been used as a court for table tennis, a young man sat with papers in each hand. He was reading closely.
Blueberry ice cream? I said, with the cautious cadence of clearing my throat. I handed him my form and he took it, not looking, in fact analyzing me instead. He stamped its back.
Door number 6, he said.
Door number 6 was across a mighty river. White searchlights reflected from its surface. In the distance, over its roar, gunfire echoed.
Between doors 6 and 8 a church was used as an ersatz hospital. Soldiers lay askew in the grass outside it, many missing arms and legs. The mess hall, near, in what had been the narthex, had a freezer with three drums of ice cream: all rum raisin.
Blueberry’s door 14, a canteen man said.
Door 14 was shattered by gunfire though. Only the frame remained. Taped to it, typed, a printed notice said, Door 14 temporarily unavailable. Use door 17 until otherwise notified. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.
War camels, though, had mutinied outside door 17. They filled the night with camel screams and smells of camel urine. With time though I discovered a friendly camel, and he let me pass to use the door.
Door 17: my final door.
Behind it a pair of beautiful old men attacked an ant-eater. They beat it, legs and hands, till its blood bubbled up to bruises. They were after blueberry ice cream as well.
Goddamned blueberry ice cream.
I couldn’t be the sentimental type. No: as in The Tragedy of Y—, with a mandolin across their backs, I killed both men and their ant-eater. I went to the freezer and pulled some ice cream out: blueberry now.
Would you like dry ice? the woman behind the counter asked me.
Thirty minutes worth, I told her, cool.
By the time I got home, it was already five in the morning. My girlfriend had fallen back to sleep.
translator's note: ever heard of kobo abe? murakami has! personally i'm an abe fan as well, to the point of naming my grad school thesis partially after him, so hey, i get it too. i find it wonderful. this kinda shit is why i wanted to try this translation here: literary shitposts. i just had to pull my own voice back in this (as much as possible). god, i wanted such longer paragraphs
how bout you ray? (2026-10 weekly post)
look: i have finished a first good draft of Scott and Bianca
look: the snow has melted and allergies occur
no matter events otherwise this week will have been sad. a good friend moved back to florida literally yesterday, as to shadow over all other events. time and change are noticed most when sad. etc etc.
let’s leave it then as that: representation
Beer, by Haruki Murakami
-- In honor of
Jingu Stadium
Matsoka's home runs are not
hit for me
—— So the unhappy
beer vendor tells us
1981/5/16
from “An Anthology of Yakult Swallows Poetry”
my translation of the seventy-fifth story (out of 99) of 夢で会いましょう [Meet Me in a Dream] by Haruki Murakami and Shigesato Itoi, not guaranteed to be accurate. see the intro post to read more!
basically an answer to a question (2026-09 weekly post)
arrange your lifes events by alphabetical. does it change how you experience life?
last week was, unremarkably, full of snow: the blizzard monday, snowmen that night (i need to learn a way to upload pictures), walking many nights out thru the cold to ie bars, skating rinks, dropping off medicine at train stations, karaoke. men yelling: monday to thank snow shovelers (who didnt care), sunday at low-wage workers at wendy’s, for making him wait a whole half hour, for which knocking down plastic shelves seemed proper payment
im having fun writing this-like. not incidentally, reading Djuna Barnes
but the worlds been very bad this week. you know this. you and me both live in it. in addition a very good friend is moving out of town and i dont want this. shouganai
writing
new translation post. getting deep into Scott and Bianca. wrote the chapter of the Human Fuck House. futzing with failure at interactive poems. one day ill get there (or die first)