Two Billion Light-Years of Solitude

While visiting my local bookstore, a routine I do monthly, by chance I came across a title I was familiar with, yet didn’t know the book existed. It was “Two Billion Light-Years of Solitude” or 二十億光年の孤独 (Nijuu Kounen no Kodoku), a poem collection by Tanikawa Shuntarou. Admittedly I’m not too well versed about poets and only know a handful of famous ones, such as Miyazawa Kenji.

I stopped my track and picked up the book. It was a bunko, with double printing of both the original Japanese poems and English translation.

The title was, much to my shock, the lyrics to My First Story’s “Nijuuoku Kounen no Koi” in which the song ends with “Because you’ve given me sollitude that lasts for two billion light-years”. The song itself sings of a love that has left the singer, seemingly becoming a star and having a distance of two billion light-years to travel to.

My first impression of the song was that it seemed to perfectly fit my OCs, Arca and Takashi at the end of their stories. After Arca‘s death Takashi had all the time in the world in sollitude to ponder his feelings for Arca. At the end of it, he realizes his feelings had been love.

For Takashi, his life had been dark as if he’d been trapped in a coffin with no way out; not even death. It was Arca who dug him out of his hole and showed him the stars, so stars are associated with the pair.

Needless to say, I have grown attached to the song as it portrays my OCs very well.

Back to present, I was quite surprised to find a book with the title of the lyrics I’ve grown to like a lot. I then realize the song was a homage to the book, as the book is quite famous in Japanese society for it to be reprinted in 2023, when it was first published in 1952.

After digging up the wikipedia article, the poem collection was Tanikawa Shuntarou’s first publication. The editor of the book states that the poem was created by Tanikawa when he decided to work on building model aircrafts and assemblying radios after high school graduation. He decided to not purse highed education in university. Oooka Makoto, a poet and literary critic, views the poem collection as “the story of a boy who opened his eyes to the skies and the galaxy, before he opened his eyes to the society around him. Tinged with sorrow, the boy’s eyes gleam in sollitude, rather than letting it drown in tears”.

As a literature student, the story of the poem, how it relates to me/ my interest, and ultimately to my own creation, I find that the whole circle is a very natural and beautiful thing. To inspire and be inspired is the what makes creations worth being created.