If you were to walk deep into the valleys of ancient Japan, far beyond the bustling streets of the old capital, where the wooden temples smell of fresh cedar, you would find yourself in a world of silence.
There, the mountains rise like sleeping green dragons, their shoulders wrapped in cloaks of mist. And if you listened closely, past the rush of the mountain streams, you would hear a sound like no other.
The dry, hollow whisper of a bamboo grove. It is a sound of rustling leaves, of tall green stocks swaying and knocking together in the wind, like quiet wooden bells.
In one of these valleys, more than a thousand years ago, lived an old man named Sanuki Nomiyatsuko. The people of his village simply called him the bamboo cutter.
Every morning, before the sun had even warmed the peaks, the old man would shoulder his sharp iron axe and walk into the forest. He would select the strongest, most flexible stocks of bamboo, cut them down, split them into thin supple strips, and weave them into baskets, trays, and hats.
It was a simple, quiet life. He and his wife were poor, and their small wooden hut with its thatched roof was often cold in the winter. They had no children to help them or to fill their home with laughter.
And as the years crept up on them like the evening shadows, a gentle sadness settled over their hearth.
But old stories have a way of turning in unexpected directions. This tale, which is called the Tale of the Bamboo Cutter, is the oldest written story in the history of Japan.
For 10 centuries, grandmothers and grandfathers have told it to children on nights when the moon is round and bright. There are many ways to tell it, because a story that lives for a thousand years grows new leaves with every generation.
But this is the way it has traveled down to us through the long halls of time.
On a morning that seemed no different from any other, the old bamboo cutter walked deeper into the grove than he usually did. The air was cool and smelled of damp earth and moss.
As he moved through the towering green stocks, he noticed a strange light reflecting off the wet leaves. It was not the golden light of the morning sun, nor was it the gray light of the mist.
It was a soft, pale green radiance, like the glow of a firefly on a summer night.
Intrigued, the old man pushed aside the ferns and followed the light. He found that it was coming from a single, slender stock of bamboo. The stock was shining from within, its green skin translucent, as if someone had placed a warm candle inside its hollow center.
The bamboo cutter stood still, his heart beating a little faster. "I have cut bamboo since I was a boy," he whispered to himself. "But I have never seen a stock that carried its own lantern."
He approached the shining plant with great reverence. Kneeling on the damp earth, he raised his axe. With a hand that trembled only slightly, he made a clean, gentle cut just above the root.
The stock fell away, and the old man gasped. Inside the hollow chamber of the bamboo, resting on a bed of soft, glowing fibers, was a tiny girl. She was no taller than three inches, about the length of a grown man's thumb, but she was perfectly formed.
Her hair was as black and fine as silk thread. Her skin was as pale as a plum blossom, and she wore a tiny, exquisite robe that seemed to be woven from the light itself. She was fast asleep, her breathing so quiet, it was barely a sigh.
The old man felt a warmth bloom in his chest that he had not felt in all his long years. He reached out his rough, calloused hand, and very gently, the tiny girl opened her eyes. They were dark and bright, and when she saw him, she did not cry.
Instead, she reached up her tiny arms and smiled. "You are a gift," the old man whispered, his eyes filling with tears. "A beautiful, secret gift."
He cradled her in the palm of his hand, protecting her from the morning breeze with his sleeve, and ran all the way back to his cottage.
His wife was sitting by the cold hearth when he burst through the door. "Wife!" he cried, out of breath. "Look what I have found in the grove!"
The old woman hurried over, expecting perhaps a rare root or a strange bird. But when she looked into her husband's hands and saw the tiny, glowing child, she let out a soft cry of wonder.
She took the little girl into her own hands, marveling at how light she was, like a feather or a dry leaf.
"We have no children of our own," the old woman said, her voice shaking with joy. "The heavens have seen our lonely hearts and sent us this little one. We must cherish her."
They made a tiny cradle for her out of a lacquered box, lining it with the softest scraps of silk they could find. They fed her drops of sweet water and milk, and watched over her night and day.
But the wonders did not stop there. The very next morning, when the old man returned to the forest to work, he approached a normal, dark stock of bamboo. When he cut it open, a shower of bright, heavy gold coins tumbled out of the hollow joint and clattered onto the forest floor.
The bamboo cutter stared in disbelief. He tried another stock, and then another. Inside every single one he cut that day, there was gold.
From that afternoon onward, the old man never went hungry again. Whenever he went into the forest, the bamboo yielded enough gold to buy fine rice, warm clothes, and a beautiful, spacious house with sliding paper screens and a garden of raked gravel and stone lanterns.
Yet, though they were suddenly wealthy, the old couple did not care for the gold. Their eyes were fixed entirely on the tiny girl who had brought it to them.
The child did not grow as other children do. She did not take years to learn to crawl, to walk, or to speak. Instead, she grew in months, as if she were a flower blooming in a single warm spring.
By the time three months had passed, she was no longer three inches tall. She had grown to the size of a normal child. And then, before the year was out, she had become a fully grown young woman.
But she was not like any young woman the villagers had ever seen. She seemed to carry a piece of the night sky within her. Even on the darkest, stormiest nights, when the wind howled through the valley and the lamps were extinguished, the room where she sat remained filled with a soft, silver radiance.
It was as if the moon had come down to rest upon the tatami mats. Her skin was so fair, it seemed to glow. Her hair fell in a long, dark river down her back, and her voice was like the sound of water falling over smooth stones.
Her foster parents knew that she was not an ordinary human being, but they loved her with a fierce, protective devotion. They hired a wise priest to give her a name worthy of her beauty.
The priest looked at her, standing in her silver light, and said, "She shall be called Nayotake no Kaguya Hime, the Princess of Flexible Bamboo, who shines with light."
To her parents, she was simply Kaguya.
As Kaguya grew, her parents kept her hidden away in their grand new house. They did not do this out of cruelty, but out of fear. They knew that the world could be a harsh place for something so beautiful and rare.
They wanted to keep her safe, to keep her light just for themselves, in the quiet sanctuary of their home.
But secrets have a way of escaping, like smoke rising from a chimney. The servants who worked in the house whispered to the merchants in the market. The merchants spoke to the travelers, and the travelers carried the news along the dusty roads of Japan.
Soon, everyone was talking about the bamboo cutter's daughter. They spoke of a girl who did not need candles to light her room, whose beauty was so great that just to catch a glimpse of her shadow against a paper screen could cure a sick man of his fever.
Young men began to gather outside the high wooden walls of the estate. At first, there were only a few, but soon there were dozens, then hundreds. They stood in the dust of the road, hoping that a gust of wind might lift a curtain, or that she might step into the garden for a moment.
They wrote poems of love on delicate paper, and tied them to the branches of the pine trees outside the gate. They stayed through the heat of the summer and the cold rains of autumn, refusing to leave.
Eventually, as the seasons turned, most of the suitors realized their hopes were in vain. They grew tired of waiting in the dust and returned to their homes, their poems unanswered.
But five men remained. These five were not ordinary villagers. They were noblemen of the highest rank, three princes and two powerful ministers of the Imperial court. They were men who were used to getting whatever they desired.
They had wealth, power, and armies of servants. They believed there was nothing on earth that could not be bought, conquered, or won.
They stood outside the bamboo cutter's gate day after day, their fine silk robes stained with dust, demanding to speak with the old man.
At last, the bamboo cutter could ignore them no longer. He went to Kaguya's room, where she sat weaving a piece of white silk. The room, as always, was filled with her gentle, cool light.
"My dear daughter," the old man said, bowing his head. "I am an old man, and my hair is the color of frost. My wife and I cannot protect you forever. Outside our gate stand five of the greatest lords in the land. They wish to marry you.
It is the way of the world that a young woman must choose a husband to care for her when her parents are gone. I beg of you, choose one of these five noblemen."
Kaguya looked at her father, her dark eyes filled with a quiet, melancholy grace. "Father," she said softly, "I do not wish to marry. I am happy here with you and mother. I do not wish to leave this house."
"But they will not go away!" the old man pleaded. "They are powerful men. If we refuse them, they may bring trouble upon our house. Is there truly no one among them you could love?"
Kaguya was silent for a long moment. She looked out the window at the sky, where the pale ghost of the daytime moon was visible.
"Very well," she said, and a small, mysterious smile touched her lips. "I will marry the one who can prove his love is true. But they must not prove it with words or gold. They must prove it by bringing me five treasures from the corners of the earth.
These are things I have long wished to see."
"Tell me what they are," her father said, relieved, "and I will tell the lords."
"The first," Kaguya said, "is Prince Ishizukuri. He must bring me the stone begging bowl of the historical Buddha, which is said to reside in India and glow with a holy purple light.
The second is Prince Kuramochi. He must travel to the mythical island of Horai, which rises from the eastern sea, and bring me a branch from the tree that grows there, a branch with a trunk of gold, twigs of silver, and pearls for fruit.
The third is the Minister of the Right, Abe no Miyushi. He must bring me the robe made of the fur of the fire rat, which is found in the land of China. This robe is of a deep scarlet, and it can never be burned by fire. Indeed, the only way to clean it is to throw it into the flames.
The fourth is the Great Counselor, Otomo no Miyuki. He must find the great dragon that lives in the deep ocean, and bring me the five-colored glittering jewel that grows upon its head.
And the fifth," Kaguya concluded, her voice dropping to a whisper, "is the Middle Counselor, Isonokami no Marotari. He must find the nest of the swallows that live in the rafters of the old Imperial granary, and bring me the lucky cowry shell that a swallow holds in its belly when it lays its eggs."
The old bamboo cutter wrote these tasks down on a scroll of paper. He felt a cold shiver run down his spine, for he knew that these were not ordinary requests. They were impossible.
But he took the scroll out to the gate and read it to the five waiting lords.
The noblemen listened in silence, their faces growing pale. They realized that the shining princess had not set them a test of love. She had set them a trap of words.
But they were proud men, and they could not back down in front of each other. They bowed, took their copies of the tasks, and departed, each determined to win the princess of light by fair means or by foul.
Now, the search for the five treasures was a grand and foolish affair. And if you had been there, you might have laughed to see how these proud men tried to outsmart the clever princess.
The first suitor, Prince Ishizukuri, was a man who did not like to exert himself. He had no intention of traveling across the dangerous mountains and wide seas to India to find a stone bowl.
"All stone bowls look alike in the dark," he muttered to himself. Instead of journeying to India, he traveled to a small, dusty temple in the hills near Kyoto. There, behind the main altar, he found an old, soot-stained stone pot that the monks used for holding charcoal.
He took the pot, polished it with a silk cloth, wrapped it in a magnificent cloth of gold, and brought it to Kaguya's house. He presented it with a great flourish. "My princess," he lied, bowing low. "I have crossed deserts and climbed frozen peaks to bring you the holy bowl of the Buddha."
Kaguya took the package. She unwrapped the gold cloth and looked at the dirty stone pot. Then she placed it on the floor. The room remained lit only by her own silver glow. The pot did not emit even a single spark of holy light.
She looked at the prince with a gentle, pitying gaze. "Prince Ishizukuri," she said, "the bowl of the Buddha is said to shine like the morning star. This pot has only the smell of old charcoal. You should return it to the temple where you found it."
The prince turned red with shame, gathered up his dirty pot, and slunk away.
The second suitor, Prince Kuramochi, was much cleverer. He knew that the island of Horai was a myth, a place that existed only in stories. So, he did not sail into the eastern sea.
Instead, he locked himself in his mansion and hired the 12 finest gold and silversmiths in the country. He paid them a fortune to work in absolute secrecy.
For many months, the smiths hammered and polished until they had created a breathtaking masterpiece. It was a branch of solid gold with delicate silver twigs and leaves made of polished white pearls. It looked exactly as Kaguya had described.
The prince brought the branch to Kaguya's house, accompanied by a long letter describing the terrible storms he had faced at sea and the strange monsters he had fought to reach the island of Horai.
Kaguya looked at the branch. It was, indeed, beautiful, and for a moment, her heart sank. She feared she would have to marry this man. But just as she was about to speak, there was a loud commotion at the gate.
The 12 silversmiths had forced their way into the courtyard. They fell to their knees before the old bamboo cutter, crying, "Lord, we have worked night and day for a year to make the gold and silver branch for Prince Kuramochi, and he has fled without paying us our wages! We beg of you, make him pay!"
Kaguya smiled, her eyes twinkling like stars. She turned to the prince, who was trembling with embarrassment. "It seems, Prince Kuramochi, that your journey to Horai was very short, and that your monsters were only honest craftsmen. Please, take your branch and pay your debts."
The prince, ruined and disgraced, fled into the forest and was never seen in the capital again.
The third suitor, Minister Abe, was a very wealthy man. He sent a trusted messenger with a chest of gold to the land of China to buy the legendary fire rat robe from a wealthy merchant.
The messenger returned a year later with a magnificent robe of deep, rich scarlet silk that shimmered like fire. The minister was overjoyed. He dressed in his finest clothes and brought the robe to Kaguya.
"This is the true fire rat robe," he declared proudly. "It cost me a mountain of gold."
Kaguya looked at the beautiful red cloth. "It is indeed lovely," she said. "But we must test it. If it is the true robe of the fire rat, the flames will not harm it. Let us throw it into the hearth."
The minister laughed confidently. "Of course, let us do so."
They threw the scarlet robe into the center of the roaring fire. For a second, it lay upon the logs. Then, with a bright whoosh, the silk caught fire, turned to black ash, and disappeared up the chimney.
The minister stared at the empty grate, his mouth open in horror. He had been cheated by the Chinese merchant, and now he had lost both his gold and his princess. He went home in silence, his head bowed.
The fourth suitor, Great Counselor Otomo, was a brave but foolish man. He decided he would actually find the dragon. He gathered a crew of strong sailors, boarded a great warship, and sailed into the southern seas.
"I will find the dragon and rip the jewel from its head!" he shouted to the wind.
But the ocean is a vast and terrible place. A great storm arose. The sky turned as black as ink, and waves as high as mountains crashed over the deck. The wind ripped the sails to shreds, and lightning split the mast in two.
The counselor, who had never been on the ocean before, became terribly seasick. He lay on the deck, clutching the railing, weeping with terror. "The dragon is angry!" he screamed. "The dragon is coming to eat us! Forgive me, great dragon, I do not want your jewel!"
He threw his swords and his gold into the sea as an offering to the waves. The storm eventually subsided, but the ship was wrecked on a distant, rocky shore. The counselor washed up on the sand, his fine clothes in rags, his eyes swollen shut from the salt water, and his body bruised from head to toe.
He crawled back to the capital on foot, vowing never to look at a woman or the sea again.
The fifth suitor, Middle Counselor Isonokami, was the most unfortunate of all. He stayed in the capital and watched the swallows that nested in the high rafters of the Imperial granary. He built a great wooden tower so he could reach the nests.
One evening, he saw a swallow fly into its nest. "Now!" he cried. "The bird is laying its egg! It must have the cowry shell!"
He climbed up the shaky tower, reached his hand deep into the dark nest, and felt something small and hard. "I have it!" he shouted to his servants below. "I have the treasure!"
But in his excitement, he leaned too far. The wooden tower creaked and collapsed. The counselor fell through the air and landed with a terrible crash on a stone water trough.
He lay there, groaning in agony, his back broken. But he clutched his hand tightly to his chest. "Look," he whispered to his servants, "I have the shell! Bring a lamp so I may see it."
They brought a lamp and opened his hand. Inside was not a lucky cowry shell, but a small, dry piece of bird dropping.
The counselor was so heartbroken and embarrassed that he fell into a deep sickness. And though he survived his broken bones, his spirit was crushed, and he never spoke of the princess of light again.
And so, the five great lords were defeated, not by armies, but by their own greed, pride, and dishonesty.
Kaguya remained in her father's house, her silver light undisturbed. And for a time, there was peace.
But the peace of a quiet valley cannot last forever when it holds a light that shines so bright. Word of the five suitors and their spectacular failures eventually reached the ears of the Emperor of Japan, the Mikado himself.
He sat in his great palace of polished black wood, surrounded by his ministers and scholars, and listened to the strange reports. "Who is this girl?" the Emperor asked, "who can turn away princes and ministers with such cleverness? Is she a sorceress, or is she truly as beautiful as they say?"
He decided he must see her for himself. But the Emperor could not simply walk down the road like a common suitor. He arranged for a grand Imperial hunt in the hills near the bamboo cutter's estate.
On the day of the hunt, while his huntsmen were chasing deer through the forest, the Emperor slipped away from his retinue. Guided by a local villager, he rode his white horse to the gate of the bamboo cutter's house.
He entered the courtyard quietly, without announcement. The house was still and silent. He walked up the wooden steps and pushed aside the sliding paper screen of the inner chamber.
There, sitting by her weaving loom, was Kaguya. She was not wearing her formal robes. She wore only a simply gown of pale green. Her back was to him, but as she turned her head, the Emperor felt his breath leave his body.
It was not just that her face was perfect, or that her hair fell like a curtain of midnight silk. It was the light. She sat in a pool of silver radiance that seemed to wash away all the noise, the dust, and the worries of his empire.
For the first time in his life, the Emperor felt entirely at peace.
"Who are you?" he whispered.
Kaguya started. She rose quickly, her silver robes rustling, and bowed low. "Your Majesty," she said, her voice like the chiming of glass. "You should not be here. This is a humble house."
The Emperor stepped forward, his hand outstretched. "Come with me to the palace," he said, his voice filled with a sudden, desperate longing. "I will make you my Empress. You shall have gardens of jade and robes of gold. You do not belong in this dusty valley."
Kaguya looked at him, and in her eyes, the Emperor saw a deep, ancient sadness. It was not the cold refusal she had given the five lords, but a gentle, sorrowful shaking of her head.
"Your Majesty," she said, "if I were to go to your palace, I would fade away like mist before the morning sun. I am not of your world. I cannot be your wife, and I cannot leave this valley."
The Emperor was a man of great power, but he was also a man of honor. He saw that her words were not a game or a test. They were the truth. If he used his soldiers to force her to come, he would only destroy the light he had fallen in love with.
"Then let me be your friend," the Emperor said softly. He turned and left her room, riding back to his palace in silence. But he did not forget her.
From that day on, a new kind of light entered Kaguya's life. It was the light of ink on paper.
The Emperor began to write to her. He did not write of state affairs or the politics of the court. He wrote of the things he saw, the first plum blossom of the spring, the way the mist clung to the pines in the morning, the sound of the wild geese flying south for the winter.
He wrote beautiful, delicate poems, using the finest black ink on paper that smelled of sandalwood. And Kaguya wrote back. She found that she looked forward to the arrival of the Imperial messengers.
She would sit by her window, grinding her own ink on a stone slab, and write poems in reply. They shared their thoughts on the fleeting nature of life, the beauty of the seasons, and the quiet sadness of the world.
Though they were separated by miles of mountain roads and the rigid walls of courtly custom, their minds met on the page. They became true friends, closer than many husbands and wives, sharing a quiet, secret understanding that needed no touch and no physical presence.
Three years passed in this way, like a quiet river flowing through a green valley. The bamboo cutter and his wife grew older, their faces lined with wrinkles, but their hearts were full as they watched their daughter write her letters and tend to her garden.
They began to believe that this peaceful life would last forever. But the seasons always turn, and the moon that waxes must also wane.
It was the spring of the fourth year since the Emperor's visit. The cherry blossoms had fallen, leaving the ground covered in a carpet of pale pink petals, and the hot, heavy air of summer was beginning to settle over the valley.
It was during these days that the old bamboo cutter noticed a change in his daughter. Kaguya no longer smiled when she wrote her letters. When the sun went down and the moon rose in the evening sky, she would stand on the veranda, staring up at the silver disc with a look of intense, heartbreaking longing.
As the weeks passed, and the moon grew rounder each month, her sadness deepened. She began to weep. At first, she wept quietly in her room, but by the time the summer had reached its height, she was sobbing openly, her tears falling like dew on her silver sleeves.
Her foster parents were frantic with worry. They knelt before her, their old hands trembling. "Our sweet child, our shining princess," the old man cried. "What is the matter? Are you ill? Has someone harmed you? Tell us, so we may help you."
Kaguya looked at them, her face pale, her eyes red with weeping. She took their hands in hers. Their hands were warm and dry and smelled of the earth. Her hands were cool, like river stones in winter.
"My dear father, my sweet mother," she said, her voice breaking. "I have kept a secret from you for many years. I am not a human being of this earth. I do not belong to this valley, nor to this country, nor to this world."
The old couple stared at her, their hearts freezing in their chests.
"I come from the capital of the moon," Kaguya said, pointing up to the silver orb that hung in the night sky. "It is a place of eternal peace, where there is no sickness, no old age, and no death.
Long ago, I committed a small fault there, a mistake of the heart. And as a punishment, I was exiled to the earth for a time. I was sent to live among humans, to feel your warmth, your sorrow, and your love.
And oh," she wept, pressing her mother's hand to her cheek. "I have loved you so much! You have been the kindest, gentlest parents a child could ever wish for. But my exile is at an end. My people on the moon have decreed that I must return.
On the 15th day of this eighth month, when the moon is at its roundest and brightest, they will come down from the sky to take me home."
The old bamboo cutter let out a cry of agony. "No!" he shouted, his voice echoing through the silent house. "I found you in the bamboo! You are my daughter! I will not let them take you! I will build a wall of iron around this house! I will hire a thousand soldiers!"
He wrote a frantic letter to the Emperor, begging for help.
When the Emperor read the letter, his heart was filled with a cold dread. He could not bear the thought of the world losing its light, of losing the friend who understood his soul through the quiet medium of ink and paper.
"I will protect her!" the Emperor declared.
He mobilized his Imperial army. On the 14th day of the eighth month, 2,000 of the Emperor's finest samurai marched into the bamboo cutter's valley. They were armed with long bows, sharp spears, and heavy iron shields.
They lined the high wooden walls of the estate. They stood on the tiled roof of the house, their bows drawn, their eyes scanning the night sky. They filled the courtyard, their armor clinking in the cool night air. The Emperor's personal guard stood outside Kaguya's door, their swords unsheathed.
Inside the room, the old bamboo cutter and his wife sat on the floor, holding Kaguya tightly between them. They had locked the heavy wooden doors and barred the windows with thick beams of oak.
"Do not fear, my child," the old man whispered, though his own body was shaking. "No one can pass 2,000 of the Emperor's guards. You are safe here."
Kaguya looked at them with a love that was deeper than the sea, but her eyes were filled with a terrible, gentle pity. "Father," she said softly. "Your walls of wood and iron cannot stop the people of the moon. Your arrows cannot pierce their light. When they come, your soldiers will not be able to fight.
But I thank you with all my heart for trying to keep me."
The night wore on. The air grew still and cold. The wind stopped rustling the bamboo leaves. The insects in the grass fell silent.
Then, at the stroke of midnight, the moon reached the highest point in the sky.
Suddenly, the darkness vanished. A light poured down from the heavens, so bright and pure that it made the daytime sun seem like a dim candle. It was a cool, silver-white light that filled every corner of the valley, casting no shadow.
The 2,000 samurai on the roof and walls raised their bows, preparing to shoot. But as the light touched them, a strange thing happened. The strength drained from their arms. Their bows felt as heavy as lead, and their fingers grew numb.
A feeling of profound, irresistible peace washed over them, like a warm bath after a long journey. They did not feel fear. They felt only a quiet, beautiful drowsiness.
One by one, their weapons slipped from their hands and clattered to the ground. The soldiers stood frozen, their eyes wide, unable to move a muscle, staring up at the sky with smiles of gentle wonder on their faces.
Down from the sky, riding upon a cloud of silver mist, came a magnificent chariot. It was drawn by white horses with manes like starlight, and it was surrounded by a host of shining, silent, celestial beings.
They wore robes of spun silver and carried instruments that made no sound, yet filled the air with a vibration of perfect harmony.
The chariot descended into the courtyard, hovering just above the ground. The heavy wooden doors of the house, locked and barred with oak, simply dissolved into light.
The leader of the moon people, a tall being with eyes like cool stars, stepped forward. He did not speak with words, but his voice echoed in the minds of everyone present.
"Sanuki no Miyatsuko," the celestial being said. "You have cared well for the Princess Kaguya. For your kindness, you were given gold and long life. But her time of exile is over. You must let her return to her true home."
The old bamboo cutter and his wife could not move. They lay on the floor, weeping silently, their arms still wrapped around Kaguya's waist.
Kaguya stood up. Her silver light was now identical to the light of the celestial beings. She looked down at her foster parents, her heart aching with a very human pain. "I must go," she whispered.
She knelt and embraced them one last time, her tears wetting their gray hair. "Thank you," she said. "Thank you for the warm food, the soft silk, the quiet garden, and the deep, earthly love. I will never forget you."
The moon people brought forward two things: a small, lacquered vial containing the elixir of immortality, which would grant eternal life to anyone who drank it, and a magnificent robe made of white feathers, known as the Hagoromo.
"Put on the robe of feathers," the celestial leader said. "It will wash away the dust of this earth, and you will feel no more sorrow, no more pain, and no more regret."
But Kaguya held up her hand. "Wait," she said. "Before I put on the robe, let me write my farewells. For once I wear it, I will no longer remember who I am leaving behind."
She sat at her desk for the last time. With a hand that did not tremble, she wrote a letter to her parents, thanking them for their love and promising that she would look down on them from the sky every night.
Then, she took a fresh sheet of paper and wrote a letter to the Emperor.
"Your Majesty," she wrote. "I am sorry I could not stay to see the plum blossoms bloom again. I leave you my heart in these words, and I leave you this vial of the elixir of immortality so that you may live forever and rule your land with wisdom.
When you look at the moon, know that I am there and that I remember our friendship."
She sealed the letter and placed the vial of elixir beside it. Then, she turned to the moon people. They placed the robe of feathers over her shoulders. Instantly, a change came over Kaguya.
The tears stopped falling from her eyes. The sorrow left her face, replaced by a cool, serene, and beautiful emptiness. Her eyes, which had been filled with such warm, human love, became as clear and distant as the winter stars.
She no longer looked at her weeping parents. She no longer looked at the letters she had written. She had forgotten the taste of rice, the smell of the damp earth, and the sound of the wind in the bamboo.
She stepped into the silver chariot. The white horses leaped into the air, and the cloud of mist began to rise.
The 2,000 guards watched in silent wonder as the chariot ascended, a streak of silver light climbing higher and higher into the night sky, until it merged with the bright, round face of the moon.
The light faded. The valley returned to darkness. The wind began to rustle the bamboo leaves once more, a quiet, lonely sound in the night.
The old bamboo cutter and his wife lay on the floor of their empty house, clutching the letter Kaguya had left behind. Their hearts broken in a way that no gold could ever mend.
When the Emperor received Kaguya's farewell letter and the vial of the elixir of immortality, he did not rejoice. He sat on his throne of polished wood, the letter in his hand, and wept.
"What use is eternal life to me?" the Emperor whispered. "If I must live it in a world without her light? What use is immortality if I can never share my poems with her again?"
He called his chief messenger to his side. "Take this letter," the Emperor commanded, "and take this vial of the elixir of immortality. Travel to the highest mountain in our land, the mountain that rises closest to the heavens, in the province of Suruga.
Climb to its very peak, where the wind blows closest to the sky. There, build a great fire, and burn both the letter and the elixir, so that their smoke may rise into the heavens and reach the princess of the moon."
The messenger did as he was told. He climbed the steep, snow-covered slopes of the great mountain, built a pyre of cedar wood, and cast the letter and the vial into the flames. The sweet-smelling smoke of the burning paper and the magical elixir rose in a straight, white column, climbing up through the clouds, higher and higher, towards the silver face of the moon.
And it is said that the fire of that elixir never truly went out. The name of that great mountain became Fuji, which means immortality. And even to this day, if you look at the peak of Mount Fuji on a clear, quiet night, you can see a faint, white wisp of smoke rising from its crest, carrying the Emperor's final, unspoken words up into the starry sky, searching for a princess who forgot she ever lived on earth.
Now, as you settle into your blankets, and the quiet of the night fills your room, let us think about the old bamboo cutter. He lost the daughter he loved so dearly, and his house was left quiet and still.
But for a few short years, his home had been filled with a light that most people only dream of. He had held the moon in the palm of his hand.
So, here is a question to keep with you as you drift off to sleep. The old man could not keep Kaguya. But was she a gift he lost, or was she a gift he was given for a while? And can you ever truly keep something you love if it was never yours to keep?