Matsuo Basho (1644 – 1694)
Major Japanese poet, primarily known for his achievements in the haikai no renga and haiku forms, and his poetic diaries.
Page 1 of 1
Breaking the silence
Of an ancient pond,
A frog jumped into water –
A deep resonance.
Travelling, sick
My dreams roam
On a withered moor.
It rains during the morning. No visitors today. I feel lonely and amuse myself by writing at random. These are the words:
Who mourns makes grief his master.
Who drinks makes pleasure his master.
All who have achieved excellence in art possess one thing in common; that is, a mind to be one with nature, throughout the seasons.
The haiku that reveals seventy to eighty percent of its subject is good. Those that reveal fifty to sixty percent, we never tire of.
My body, now close to fifty years of age, has become an old tree that bears bitter peaches, a snail which has lost its shell, a bagworm separated from its bag; it drifts with the winds and clouds that know no destination. Morning and night I have eaten traveler's fare, and have held out for alms a pilgrim's wallet.
[E]very day is a journey, and the journey itself is home.
Bird of time –
in Kyoto, pining
for Kyoto.
Spring is passing by!
Birds are weeping and the eyes
Of fish fill with tears.
The summer grasses—
Of brave soldiers' dreams
The aftermath.
He who creates three to five haiku poems during a lifetime is a haiku poet. He who attains to completes ten is a master.
Old pond,
leap-splash –
a frog.
The fact that Saigyo composed a poem that begins, "I shall be unhappy without loneliness," shows that he made loneliness his master.
The passing of spring—
The birds weep and in the eyes
Of fish there are tears.
Sick on a journey –
over parched fields
dreams wander on.
Page 1 of 1