I Am Naoko And With Naoko In Her Isolated, Mountain Retreat: Male And Female Authorities, The Police Try To Arrest, Dominate Our Lives Poem by Dennis Ryan

Monday morning, February 19, 2024 at 10: 14 and 10: 50 a.m.

—in Haruki Murakami's novel Norweigian Wood, the female character Naoko is forced to retreat to an isolated, mountain sanatorium as she has nowhere else to go to get help for her grief and tortured emotions caused by the suicides of her older sister and her boyfriend

I am Naoko and reside with her in isolation—her isolated,
mountain retreat. Is this continuing isolation self-imposed …
this continuing retreat into oneself, one's own loneliness?
No, it's highly unlikely—it's not by conscious choice.
One can't cure a sickness in isolation, without help,
which becomes her situation. A civilization that isolates,
binds, dominates women is not a civilization. Similarly,
this America, these American authorities would arrest,
bind me in handcuffs—this America is neither civilized
nor free, has become uncivilized when the police run riot
in our streets—as is the case now—run riot on our lives, dreams, and sacred ambitions. What is going on here?
Look, witness, see! So I am inside, with you to the end,
Naoko, to the bitter end, identify completely with you,
you left to yourself to cope as best you can until …
I will be a better Watanabe to you—this I promise; and
American police, beware—cut your crimes and violence.