“If I were asked to explain the Japanese spirit, I would say it
is wild cherry blossoms glowing in the morning sun!” — Motoori
Norinaga (1730-1801), nativist thinker and poet The cherry
blossom is not just another pretty flower. Pause to consider, as
you feast, drink and carol beneath the blushing petals this
season, how ancient a rite of spring your frolics are
perpetuating. Not infinitely ancient — the Nara Period
(710-784), being Chinese in orientation, imitated China in
preferring the darker, more fragrant and more assertive plum
blooming a few weeks earlier on similarly leafless branches. It
was courtiers of the succeeding Heian Period (794-1185) who
began making of ethereal sakura (cherry blossoms) what they
later became in all their glory — living poems, living symbols
of beauty, life, evanescence, death, “Japanese spirit.” But how
stately, how ceremoniously elegant Heian celebrations were in
comparison with our modern madcap revels! “… the festival of the
cherry blossoms took place in the Grand Hall.