Poem: A Small Light Shining in a Western-Style Restaurant

In an alleyway off the dazzling main street by the station,
stands a small Western-style restaurant, 'Kitchen Suzuki,'
as if seeking shelter from the rain.

Every morning at four o'clock,
while the city is still asleep,
Mr. Suzuki simmers beef bones and vegetables,
carefully skimming off the scum.

"Are you still going to all that trouble?
You won't make any profit doing that these days."

A young owner of a nearby izakaya passes by with a laugh.

"Haha, I suppose so."

Business is tough,
ingredients have gone up in price,
the average customer spend isn't rising,
and his cooking is far from the trendy 'Instagrammable' food.

On a day when cold rain beat against the shop window,
he held his head in his hands in the corner of the kitchen.
Is my stubbornness just ego?
He remembered only the things he had sacrificed,
hating his own clumsiness,
and his eyes grew hot. Just then,

the door bell rang with a 'clink'.

An elderly man in a suit holding a wet umbrella.
A regular customer who has dropped by only a few times a year
since the shop opened thirty years ago.

"Excuse me, are you closed already?"
"No... please, come in."

The old man ordered the hamburger steak set.
Mr. Suzuki, as always,
cooked it skillfully and with all his heart.

The sizzling sound and the steam.
The old man ate quietly, one bite after another,
and when he swallowed the last bite,
he slowly set down his chopsticks.

"I retired from my company today."

With eyes looking into the distance,
the old man continued.

"There are so many days when honesty is left behind,
and every time I felt like giving up, I came here.
When I took a bite, I thought,
'Ah, there is someone in this world working so foolishly,
so sincerely.
I'll try a little harder myself, without telling lies.'
That's what I thought."

The old man looked straight into Mr. Suzuki's eyes.

"Your cooking, you see, doesn't just fill the stomach.
It has supported people's lives.
Thank you for the meal, for these thirty years."

After the old man left the shop,
Mr. Suzuki couldn't move for a while.

He thought no one was watching.
He had been blaming himself for being old-fashioned.

The depths of his chest grew warm,
and what wet his cheeks
was not frustration or emptiness,
but warm tears of pride.

When he opened the back door,
the rain had stopped before he knew it,
and a small star was peeking through a gap in the clouds.





(Rei, August 2, 2026)