Burial Under the Cherry Trees: A New Approach to Death for an Aging Society

The setting is in harmony with nature, an ideal place to feel the shifting of the seasons. (© Ōnishi Naruaki)

“I’m sure Grandpa’s glad we came to visit today,” Esashi smiles. (© Ōnishi Naruaki)

Okamoto by the plot where she and her beloved cat will one day rest in peace together. (© Ōnishi Naruaki)

Okamoto points to her cat’s name Alice, which is next to her name. (© Ōnishi Naruaki)

As director, Inoue is responsible for laying flowers on each plot in the burial ground, so that even graves that family members cannot visit are not neglected. (© Ōnishi Naruaki)

This year’s Sakura memorial featured a performance of Jupiter, from Holst’s The Planets. (© Ōnishi Naruaki)

Messages left by members of the Ending Center. (© Ōnishi Naruaki)

This “second home” owned by the Ending Center is the meeting place for members of a mutual support society who call themselves “grave friends.” The center organizes various events and club activities. (© Ōnishi Naruaki)

Members are free to attend as many or as few meetings as they like. A strong sense of solidarity and trust has grown up between people who share a similar view on life and death. (© Ōnishi Naruaki)

Hoshino runs the Dokusho Café reading group. The book under discussion was a biography of the poet Ibaragi Noriko written by Gotō Masaharu. Three poems were movingly read out loud by Hoshino. (© Ōnishi Naruaki)

These thoughtfully put together “Sakura packages” are offered for elderly people who struggle to carry a heavy urn or for funerals that family members are unable to attend. (© Ōnishi Naruaki)

A member of Ending Center staff carefully carries an urn containing a member’s ashes for burial. (© Ōnishi Naruaki)

The urn is placed in the plot chosen by the deceased before her death. (© Ōnishi Naruaki)

“How many things they bring to mind: these cherry blossoms!” Matsuo Bashō once wrote. (© Ōnishi Naruaki)

Probably everyone carries their own “cherry blossom story” in their heart. Here, petals fall over the freshly turned earth where a person had been buried just the day before. (© Ōnishi Naruaki)