Your favorite Japanese Haiku?
Anyone else take great delight from it? For my part, this is some of the most exceptional poetry ever committed to writing. A lovely, laconic, splendidly refined expression of life, mood, nature and (as a rule) the attendant season.
I've taken the while to transcribe some of my favorite:
Women planting rice...
Ugly every bit
About them...
But their ancient song
- Raizan
Breaking the silence
Of an ancient pond,
A frog jumped into water-
A deep resonance.
- Basho
Dead my old fine hopes
And dry my dreaming
But still...
Iris, blue each spring
- Shushiki
*on the death of his child:
Dew evaporates
And all our world
Is dew...so dear,
So fresh, so fleeting
-Issa
One fallen flower
Returning to the
Branch?...Oh no!
A white butterfly
-Moritake
In the city fields
Contemplating
Cherry-trees...
Strangers are like friends
-Issa
Don't touch my plumtree!
Said my friend
And saying so...
Broke the branch for me
-Taigi
Amorous cat, alas
You too must yowl
With your love...
Or even worse, without!
-Yaha
Ah me! I am one
Who spends his little
Breakfast
Morning-Glory gazing
-Basho
Moon so bright for love!
Come closer, quilt...
Enfold
My passionate cold!
-Sampu
Too curious flower
Watching us pass,
Met death...
Our hungry donkey
-Basho
A saddening world:
Flowers whose sweet
Blooms must fall...
As we too, alas...
-Issa
Swallow in the dusk...
Spare my little
Buzzing friends
Among the flowers
-Basho
Hard the beggar's bed...
But sociable
And busy
With insect-talking
-Chiyo-Ni
Over the mountain
Bright the full white
Moon now smiles...
On the flower-thief
-Issa
The snake departed
But the little eyes
That glared...
Dew, shining in the grass
-Kyoshi
Giddy grasshopper
Take care...do not
Leap and crush
These pearls of dewdrop
-Issa
Sadness at twilight...
Villain! I have
Let my hand
Cut that peony
-Buson
Now be a good boy
Take good care of
Our house...
Cricket my child
-Issa
Wake! The sky is light!
Let us to the road
Again...
Companion butterfly!
-Basho
Now my loneliness
Following
The fireworks...
Look! A falling star!
-Shiki
Camellia-petal
Fell in silent dawn...
Spilling
A water-jewel
-Basho
Good evening breeze!
Crooked and
Meandering
Your homeward journey
-Issa
Oh lucky beggar!...
Bright heaven
And cool earth
Your summer outfit
-Kikaku
*flowers in the stream:
Thus too my lovely life
Must end, another
Flower...
To fall and float away
-Onitsura
I am going out...
Be good and play
Together
My cricket children
-Issa
Lady butterfly
Perfumes her wings
By floating
Over the orchid
-Basho
Live in simple faith...
Just as this
Trusting Cherry
Flowers, fades, and falls
-Issa
Night bright with stars
...Silly woman,
Whimpering:
Shall I light the lamp?
-Etsujin
Oh do not swat them...
Unhappy flies
Forever
Wringing their thin hands
-Issa
See...The heavy leaf
On the silent
Windless day...
Falls of its own will
-Boncho
Cruel autumn wind
Cutting to the
Very bones...
Of my poor scarecrow
-Issa
I must turn over...
Beware of local
Earthquakes
Bedfellow cricket!
-Issa
Dry cheerful cricket
Chirping, keeps
The autumn gay...
Contemptuous of frost
-Basho
Deepen, drop, and die
Many-hued
Chrysanthemums...
One black earth for all
-Ryusui
Autumn mosquitoes
Buzz me, bite me...
See, I am
Long prepared for death
-Shiki
Plume of pampas grass
Trembling
In every wind...
Hush, my lonely heart
-Issa
No oil to read by...
I am off to bed
But ah!...
My moonlit pillow
-Basho
Descending seaward
Far-off mountain
Waterfall...
Winter nights are still
-Kyokusui
Windy winter rain...
My silly big
Umbrella
Tries walking backward
-Shisei-Jo
Buddha on the hill...
From your holy
Nose indeed
Hangs an icicle
-Issa
This snowy morning
That black crow
I hate so much...
But he's beautiful!
-Basho
"Yes, come in!" I cried...
But at the windy
Snow-hung gate
Knocking still went on
-Kyorai
On jolly new year's day
My last year's bills
Drop in
To pay their compliments
-Anon.
*death-song:
I have known lovers...
Cherry-bloom...
The nightingale...
I will sleep content
-Anon.
*death-song:
Three loveliest things:
Moonlight...Cherry-
Bloom...Now I go
Seeking silent snow
-Rippo
Last edited by AlphaStarred on Feb-12-2007 at 19:23
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