Where the Buffalo Roamed

Oz, the author of this blog, is on I-35, driving north to Kansas City. Although it is December, there is a strong southerly wind. (Appropriately so, for Kansas is a Native American word meaning People of the South Wind.) Taking advantage of the wind, cars and trucks speed along on the turnpike like prairie schooners pushed west by the wind.

Strong winds are not unusual in Kansas. A south wind in December is.

the shaggy grass
like a buffalo herd
galloping along
Bashō no yōna, The Flint Hills, December 2021, the hills were once covered in buffalo

The Flint Hills cover north central Oklahoma and central Kansas. They are part of the prairie region of the United States that stretch from Texas to Canada. Because of the rocky soil and limited rainfall on the Flint Hills the prairie grass is shorter except along the rivers and creeks and the lowlands where the tall grass takes over. This area was once the favorite feeding grounds of the American Bison, which we call buffalo. From Spring to Winter, the buffalo roamed the plains, feeding on the massive herds which covered the hills for miles, and numbered in the tens of millions. The Native American Indians who survived on the buffalo, the Osage, the Kansas, the Sioux, the Cheyenne, the Kiowa and others, hunted the beast by horse back and on foot, and could not lessen the numbers of buffalo. Only the arrival of the White Man and the rifle and the railroad, and the farmer who claimed the grass destroyed the millions of buffalo that once roamed the Flint Hills.

The turnpike heads northeast where the deer and the antelope once played. The wolves that fed on the buffalo are gone. The antelope too. The deer remain in the woodlands.

Following a grey car
on a gray windy day,
flying along like an antelope
Bashō no yōna, The Flint Hills, December 2021

It is difficult if not impossible to capture the image grass waving in the wind, of the different grasses — Big bluestem, Indiangrass, Little bluestem, and Switchgrass, all of which grow on the Flint Hills. In December, the green chlorophyll has all faded away. What remains are a golden yellow and red. The hills are mostly treeless except along the creek beds. There the dark brown trees now shorn of leaves seem naked against the steel gray sky.

Shiwasu, 師走 is the Japanese word for the 12th lunar month.

The waving Indiangrass
was golden red
— Shiwasu
Bashō no yōna,

Listen
to the wind
— Nature’s voice
Bashō no yōna, December 2021, remembering Rachel Carson

In the Cretaceous era (145 to 66 million years ago), the central part of the United States was an inland sea.

The vast Flint Hills
an inland sea
of waving grass
Bashō no yōna, December 2021

Willa Cather gave the best descriptions of the Flint Hills in My Antonia.

The red prairie grass
Like wine-stains
On a golden cloth
Willa Cather, My Antonia

Years pass on the Flint Hills and not much changes. This past autumn, I drove through Red Cloud, Nebraska where Willa Cather grew up. It is a farming community and not much has changed since Willa lived there.

“The windy springs
and the blazing summers,
one after another”
Willa Cather, My Antonia

Cather’s full text:

“The windy springs and the blazing summers, one after another, had enriched and mellowed that flat tableland; all the human effort that had gone into it was coming back in long, sweeping lines of fertility. The changes seemed beautiful and harmonious to me; it was like watching the growth of a great man or of a great idea. I recognized every tree and sandbank and rugged draw. I found that I remembered the conformation of the land as one remembers the modelling of human faces.”

But I am not sure that all the changes are in harmony with Nature.

In his famous travelogue, Oku no Hosomichi, Matsuo Basho spoke of the passing of time:

The months and days are the travelers of eternity. The years that come and go are also voyagers. Those who float away their lives on ships or who grow old leading horses are forever journeying, and their homes are wherever their travels take them. Many of the men of old died on the road, and I too for years past have been stirred by the sight of a solitary cloud drifting with the wind to ceaseless thoughts of roaming.
Oku no Hosomichi, Matsuo Basho, introduction, 1689

Fuwa Barrier

Two poems about the Fuwa Barrier Gate, the first by Matsuo Basho, the second by the the 13th century poet and nun Abastsu.

秋風や薮も畠も不破の関
Aki-kaze ya / Yabu mo hatake mo / Fuwa no seki

an autumn wind and
fields and thickets —
Fuwa’s barriers
Nozarashi kikô, Matsuo Basho, 1684

Notes. Aki-kaze, 秋風, the autumn wind, is often bitterly cold. Seki, 関, a barrier gate to control traffic and goods (notice how the character looks like a gate with a crossing). Barrier Gates were shut at dark blocking the road. Travelers stayed in the attached house or found accommodations nearby.

So full of cracks
The (unbreakable) barrier gatehouse of Fuwa
How the rain and the moonlight
Both break in
Izayoi Nikki, nun Abatsu, 1279-80

Note. Fuwa, 不破, also meaning “unbreakable.” Fuwa no Seki,不破の関, an unbreakable Barrier Gate. Seki is gate, but it would be understood to include the gatehouse where travelers waited overnight. In Abatsu’s day, local lords used the barriers to control traffic and exact tolls.

Narai, one of the stations on the Nakasendo Way, artist, Hiroshige, original image Wikipedia

Abatsu

Abatsu (阿仏, c. 1222 – 1283), Japanese poet and nun, 尼. She served as lady-in-waiting to Princess Kuni-Naishinnō, sister to the Emperor Go-Horikawa. In addition to poetry, she kept a diary — Izayoi nikki (十六夜日記). Izayoi, 十六夜, meaning the 16th night, and nikki, 日記, meaning diary, that became the travelogue, Diary of the Waning Moon. A dispute over her son’s inheritance led her to make trip from Kyoto to Kamakura, near Edo.

Fuwa

Fuwa’s barrier gate/house was on the Nakasendo way, just west of Nagoya, near the post-town of Sekigahara. This one was totally abandoned by Basho’s time. Incidentally, Sekigahara was the site of the decisive battle in which Tokugawa Ieyasu defeated a coalition of Toyotomi loyalist clans, establishing the Tokugawa shogunate.

Basho’s inland journey took him along the Nakasendo way, where he crossed the Fuwa barrier. He also travelled the Tokaido coastal road, crossing the Hakone barrier gate, just south of Edo. Both routes connect Edo with Kyoto, the Imperial Capital. In Basho’s later travelogue, Oku no Hosomichi, he mentioned the barrier gate at Shirakawa, which led to the northern interior.

When rats drink water

Enough of the milling crowds who run about like rats, enough of the constant noise.

氷苦く偃鼠が喉をうるほせり
kōri nigaku / enso ga nodo o / uruoseri

this ice tastes bitter –
enough for a rat
to wet his throat
Tosei, who would become one day Matsuo Basho, Fukagawa, Winter 1680

Winter 1680

By the winter of 1680, the poet who would become known as Matsuo Basho (松尾芭蕉) had had enough of Edo’s city life. Nine years is enough. Enough of Nihonbashi’s theater, its music and colorful sights, enough of rich food and fine drink, enough of comfort.

Who was this poet?

He was not yet known as Basho, meaning banana, named for the frail wind-blown banana tree that would grow up outside his cottage. After the death of his early patron Tōdō Yoshitada, known as Tōdō Sengin, Basho called himself JInshichiro and Jinshiro. By the time he reached Edo, he had taken the name of Tosei, meaning Green Peach, after the Chinese Tang poet Li Bai, whose name meant White Plum.

Moving On

So, he took his meager belongings and moved from Edo to Fukagawa, 深川 just across the Sumida River. His new cottage was simple — a brushwood gate, a room or two with wooden floors covered by straw mats, a small stove for warmth and cooking. Basho, the banana plant was given to him as a housewarming gift.

In Fukagawa, he escaped the crowds, but everything was in short supply, including water.

On a winter’s day he was thirsty and stopped at a reservoir to drink, but the ice was thick. Breaking off a piece of ice, he found it brackish and bitter.

Enough to inspire the haiku above.

If Basho had in mind the ancient sayings of Zhuangzi he did not say, or did he?

Zhuangzi

Zhuangzi , 莊子 (late 4th century BC), Daoist philosopher. Post Lao Tzu and Confucius, contemporary of Mencius, author of the work, Zhuangzi. Compare him to a modern day Walt Whitman or Henry David Thoreau, one who finds beauty and happiness in Nature. One who experiences life.

A rat drinks water at the river, but no more than it needs.
Zhuangzi (莊子, 4th century BC)

Everything in moderation including bitterness. For a little bit of bitterness may inspire a man to write a haiku.

Did not Zhuangzi also say this:

This is what [the world] finds bitter: a life without comfort,
a mouth without rich food, a body without fine clothes,
eyes without beautiful sights, and ears without sweet sounds.
People who can’t get these things fret a great deal and are afraid—
this is a stupid way to treat the body.
Zhuangzi, Chapter 18

Bitterness

Severe truth is expressed with some bitterness.
Henry David Thoreau

O BITTER sprig! Confession sprig!
In the bouquet I give you place also—I bind you in, …
Walt Whitman

Both the bitter and the sweet
come from outside,
the hard from within.
Albert Einstein

Walking in the woods one day, I come upon a bright green Juniper tree full of berries. Thirsty, I eat just one. Just enough to moisten the tongue.

the Juniper berry —
dry, bitter and very small,
it’s sweet to eat just one
Bashō no yōna, December 2021

And along the lake I see a mole swimming.

A mole who drinks water
is thirsty, taking in
the sweet and the bitter
Bashō no yōna, December 2021

**Juniper berries, bitter and sweet, best I eat just one**

Moon Viewing

I recently drove back from the east coast. And, while I was in Central Missouri in the middle of nowhere, an hour or so after dusk, I caught a view of a full moon, large, round and orange, in the rear view mirror of my car. It was a breathtaking sight. My trip, and my moon spotting, corresponded roughly with the traditional day of Japanese moon viewing (Tsukimi, 月見), or September 21, 2021.

That the moon is prettier in Autumn, is, I learned later, due to the astronomical fact that the moon rises sooner in fall and at a narrower angle, making it appear to be fuller and more orange. I also learned that the moon is moving closer to earth, that is, it is in perigee, and will reach its closest on December the 4th.

Yoshitoshi Tsukioka and Noguchi Enkatsu, Engraver. One Hundred Aspects of the Moon: **Monkey-Music Moon**. Japan, 1892.

The Seasons

The 17th century Japanese operated on a lunar calendar. And each season had its own moon. Spring moon, 春の月, haru no tsuki; Summer moon, 夏の月, natsu no tsuki; Autumn moon, 秋の月, aki no tsuki; and Winter’s moon, 冬の月, fuyu no tsuki.

And here are four haiku by Matsuo Basho with seasonal references to the moon.

Spring

春もやや気色ととのふ月と梅
haru moya ya/ keshiki totonou/ tsuki to ume

Barely Spring,
a colorful complexion of
the moon and a plum blossom
Matsuo Basho, 6th year of Genroku, Spring 1693. The plum blossoms in early spring, often when snow is on the ground. An almost too perfect combination of a bright moon and heavenly scented plum blossoms.

Summer

蛸壺やはかなき夢を夏の月
tako-tsubo ya/ hakanaki yume wo/ natsu no tsuki

an octopus pot,
a fleeting dream
under a Summer moon.
Matsuo Basho, at Akashi, a seaside town near Kobe famous for its seafood. When alarmed an octopus will hide in a dark place. Thus, fishermen intentionally make pots black to catch the unwitting octopus.

Autumn

去る引の猿と世を経る秋の月
saruhiki no/ saruto yo furu/ aki no tsuki

a street entertainer–
going through life carrying a monkey
— Autumn moon
Basho, The Monkey’s Raincoat, 1691. Basho’s haiku was a response to a linked verse by Boncho. Boncho’s verse was, a new priest hurrying to the temple getting cold.

Winter

冬庭や月もいとなるむしの吟
fuyu niwa ya / tsuki mo ito naru / mushi no gin

In Winter’s garden
when the moon is a thread,
an insect sings
Matsuo Basho, 2nd year of Genroku, 1689, at a tea ceremony with Ichinyū, a tea potter and lay Buddhist teacher . It would be unusual for an insect to find food at this time of year, much less to hear an insect at all.

Note to reader

If you find fault in my translations or have comments, feel free to respond. We are after all, like Basho, students of life.

As season come
And seasons go
The moon will always glow
Bashō no yōna, November, 2021

Snowy Mt. Hira and Mikami

比良三山　雪さしわたせ　鷲の橋　

Hira Mikami yuki sashi watase sagi no hashi

Snowy Hira and Mikami
For the moment, encircled
A bridge of white herons
Matsuo Basho, Otsu on Lake Biwa, looking west to the Hira Mountains

Snowy Mount Hira, artist, Utagawa Hiroshige, 19th century, image source The Met

A bridge of birds

A bridge of birds is one of those images one comes across while walking along a lake or in a wooded field. It is a magical image, one that is fleeting. When the birds are geese, the flock noisy chatters overhead, making a familiar V-shaped formation that look like an arched bridge. Herons are stragglers, silently flapping their wings,to the accompaniment of a swooshing sound.

Soon gone and silent again.

Herons often fly alone but can on rare occasion be seen in flocks. It is a rare sight, one that Matsuo Basho enjoyed while making a day trip to Otsu on the southern shore of Lake Biwa. Basho chose Otsu as his burial place, giving this haiku added meaning.

Lost in Translation

Hira and Mikami, 比良三山, snow covered Hira mountains and Mt. Mikami. They lie on opposite sides of Lake Biwa.

Yuki, 雪, snow.

Sashi watase, さしわたせ, for the moment, plus, joined or encircled.

Sagi no hashi, 鷲の橋, literally a bridge of white herons. The No, の particle links two nouns together to show a connection, and form a single image, a bridge of birds. One does not have to assume the herons are white (Shirasagi, 白鷺), but it makes for a prettier image.

[All images in the public domain, source The Met.]

Chrysanthemum Tea

Be Quiet!

I am not quite getting there, trying to translate Basho’s haiku. Maybe, that’s the point of it. Just sip one’s tea, be quiet as a monk, admire chrysanthemums that flower. Shizukanari! Laozi would agree.

朝茶飲む　僧静かなり　菊の花
Asa cha nomu / sō shizukanari / kiku no hana
Matsuo Basho

Three variations on Matsuo Basho’s Morning Tea:

A cup of morning tea
Calms a monk
Chrysanthemums are blooming

A monk sipping his morning tea,
Calmly
— Chrysanthemums are flowering

Drinking morning tea
Calms a monk
– Chrysanthemum

Chrysanthemum tea
Three time a day
Long life

Chrysanthemum tea
My friends and I
Happy life
Bashō no yono

Chrysanthemum Tea

Chrysanthemum tea (菊茶, kiku-cha) is considered an elixir of life in Japan and much of Asia, enjoyed for the beauty of the flower’s blossoms, their earthy smell, and the taste of the tea. Each mum variety having its own special flavor. The recipe is simple, steep the flower petals (the leaves are too bitter) in hot water. Drink as a morning tea (朝茶, asa cha). Drink while hot. Morning tea and Green tea in general are soothing. Chrysanthemum tea, in particular, is used to calm chest pain, reduce high blood pressure, soften headaches, eliminate dizziness, and treat a host of other conditions.

In a word, Chrysanthemum tea is calming.

Basho suffered from various ailments throughout his life, including stomach ailments. So, it is not hard to imagine that he drank quite a lot of tea. And, after a hard days journey on the Oku No Hosomichi, one pictures Sora, Basho’s traveling companion, brewing tea while Basho is busy writing in his journal. One can also picture their visit to a temple, where a Buddhist monk (僧, Sō) might welcome his guests with tea.

Post Script

“Xin chào“ (“hello”) was the greeting we received in a friendly neighborhood cafe in Hanoi, Vietnam.

“Corona Tea!” was the drink we got when we asked for a pot of green tea and two cups.

My wife and I were there visiting our son in Hanoi in early 2020, at the start of the Coronavirus pandemic. The fear of Coronavirus was only beginning. At that time, it was only a general concern for good health, green tea being a good start.

The cafe’s setting, beside a small lake, was quiet. Lofty apartment buildings, like tall mountains, surrounded the lake, separating us from the din of a thousand motorcycles on the main streets. This made this tiny spot feel like a personal Shangri-La. That and the woman, the owner of the cafe, who smiled as she served us a steaming pot of green tea.

The tea kept us healthy, I like to think.

Madame,
How do you say, Hello?
— Xin chào, and green tea
Bashō no yono

I previously translated this haiku.

Another Rainy Day

Edo, Autumn, 1678, Matsuo Basho, then called Tosei, age 35.

雨の日や世間の秋を堺町

ame no hi / ya seken no aki o / sakai-chō

A rainy day, in Autumn the world awakens in Sakai-cho

**Sakai-cho**, **Edo’s Kabuki Theater District, Utagawa Hiroshige**

Leaving Edo

He has not yet become Bashō, 芭蕉, the poet who compares himself to the fragile and useless Banana plant. That is yet to come when, two autumns later, Matsuo Basho would take the somewhat surprising step of leaving Edo and crossing the Sumida River to Fukagawa to live in a cottage beside a Banana plant, 芭蕉.

For now, Basho enjoys Kabuki Theater. Rain doesn’t matter. Perhaps it heightens the surreal quality of the plays.

Kechi, Kansas, Autumn, 2021

More than three centuries have gone by since Matsuo Basho wrote his haiku.

Today, in 2021, pubs and micro-breweries have become the gathering place for friends and couples who want to talk about the day’s events, about the World.

It is another rainy day in Middle America. It is early September; the summer’s heat has given way to cooler days and nights. The author of this blog takes a trip to Kechi, a small Kansas town outside Wichita. He is accompanied by his wife and dog, Lucy, a small dog, a mix, mostly Blue Heeler. The three of us sit on the patio under trees strung with lights, sample the beers, listen to music, and forget our worrries.

Suddenly, it starts to storm. Lucy runs inside and shakes off the rain. Bashō no yōna, the author of this blog, and modern day Basho disciple, says this:

A dog knows
To Stay out of the Rain
And Sakai-cho

Beer stops Pouring
When it starts Raining
At the Old School House in Kechi

Notes on Translation

Before becoming Basho, Matsuo Basho took the pen name Tosei, 桃青, meaning “green peach” inferring that he was not quite ripe.

世間, Seken, literally the World, Society, as opposed to the individual. According to the Buddha, there are two worlds, the internal world and external world. Through meditation, one understands one’s thoughts and feelings, and finds one’s ‘inner world’.

境町, Sakai-chō, literally border town. It is somewhat unclear whether 境町, Sakai-chō is a place within Tokyo’s Nihonbashi District, or it merely borders it, a special district where Kabuki Theaters were allowed. Often these theaters began in Tokyo where prostitutes plied their trade. Other worldly in this sense takes on a sexual connotation. Though frowned upon by the ruling authorities, such districts were allowed. William Shakespeare and the Lord Chamberlain’s Men similarly had to obtain a royal license to perform.

Gabi Greve has given us a thorough discussion of Nihonbashi in her thoroughly wonderfully blog.

Previously translated as Rainy Day and Seken no Aki.

Historical Context

England 1678, John Bunyan published The Pilgrim’s Progress, an other worldly allegory of man’s journey through life. Japan was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and culturally isolated from Western societies.

The Sound of Cicada

One can travel by train today from Tokyo to Yamadera in less than five hours.

In 1689, Matsuo Basho made the journey by foot in four or five months, give or take a day or a week. Basho left behind the comforts of his thatched cottage in Fukagawa, his friends, and his students for an uncertain journey with his companion Sora. They arrived in Yamadera in late August. There, Basho and Sora climb the rocky steps to the mountain temple called Yamadera (山寺, lit. “Mountain Temple”), shedding each step of the way their human worries and cares, until even the wind had ceased and all was silent.

Beholding the beauty of the scene, all Basho heard was the sound of the cicada.

ah, the silence
sinking into the rocks
the voice of the cicada

閑かさや
岩にしみ入る
蝉の声

shizukasa ya
iwa ni shimi-iru
semi no koe

Basho’s haiku is inspired by my own experience with cicadas in Kansas and elsewhere. It is a common experience shared by anyone who has heard the incessant high pitched cry. What they are saying and to whom is a mystery. Perhaps, spending 16 out of 17 years underground, they are happy to be set free, learning too soon that it is time to die.

Perhaps, I wonder is it the heat?

ah, in the heat of August,
from each and every tree
comes the cry the cicada

Notes on Translation

Shizukasa could also be “such silence”, the feeling of awe that comes across the traveler when the wind dies completely and one is left alone with the beauty of Nature.

Shimi-iru is literally “penetrating,” giving one the sense the cicadas have burrowed into the rocks to escape the heat. “Sinking” is more sublime, and suggestive of a Buddhist stage of meditation.

Semi no koe, at its simplest, is the voice of the cicada, but that doesn’t stop translators from adding a little spice with verbs like “shrill of the cicada” or “cry of the cicada”.

Climbing Long’s Peak

Once on a trip to Estes Park, a friend and I camped below Longs Peak (a “fourteener” located in the Rocky Mountain National Park), having decided on the spur of the moment to make the long climb to the top. It was summer, the evening was cool. It is hard to ignore, he snores. He slept in a one man tent, I crosswise and bent in the car. The stars filled the night sky, and the Milky Way rose behind the peak we hoped to climb the next day.

Unprepared, ill-equipped, we didn’t make it all the way, but had a great time. P.S. a better climber started us out, illuminating the pathway with a headlamp that he wisely brought.

Some thoughts:

Nightfall
Too Dark to Read,
To Bed

A fool
Climbs Mt. Long
Not at all

In Darkness,
With trust in the Buddha,
I start, I stumble, I fall

One can ride horses along the trails on the mountainside. When the sun rose, we saw a few horses roaming freely on the range. One horse had only three legs.

A three legged horse
On the mountainside
Climbs better than most

In the Summer Sun
Snow melts, water gathers
A cold stream

There is still snow at the highest elevations, even in July. The summer sun melts the snow forming narrow streams. One often stops to wash the face and hands with the cold water. Then one moves on, admiring a wildflower that grows nearby.

1685 (year of Jōkyō, 貞享)

The following haiku is from Basho’s Journal of Bleached Bones (Nozarashi Kiko, 野ざらし紀行). This travelogue covered a trip that began in the fall of 1684 and ended the next spring. Basho traveled from Edo to Iga Ueno, his birthplace. After paying respects to his mother who had died the year before, he traveled to Kamigata (an are encompassing Kyoto, Kobe, and Osaka). Coming along a mountain path, Matsuo Basho spied a mountain violet (sumiregusa). This dainty purple flower with its heart shaped leaves has no smell, but it is charming nevertheless, being one of the earliest flowers to blossom in spring.

coming along a mountain path,
somehow so charming
– a wild violet

山路来て何やらゆかしすみれ草
yamaji kite/ namiyara yukashi/ sumiregusa

[ゆかし, yukashi meaning charming, endearing, or moving. This haiku inspired Enya to compose a charming song in Japanese called Sumiregusa.]

My thoughts is this:

A tiny mountain flower
Don’t pick this jewel
Just admire

Having reached the peak of Mt. Long, many climbers quickly descend, either because the peak has become crowded with other climbers, or the time of day is late and the weather uncertain. I think Basho would agree, there is joy in the summit, but the greater joy is in the journey.

It is not the summit
But the Path
I seek

Stage 25, July 1689

By July, 1689, Matsuo Basho and Sora had reached Obanazawa, three months into their Journey to the Northern Interior, and ready to rest.

[By Matsuo Basho’s reckoning, according to the Japanese lunar calendar, it was the 5th lunar month (五日, itsuka), from the 17th to the 27th, 1689.]

Basho writes:

“In Obanazawa, I met a man called Seifu (清風, a Chinese phrase meaning cool breeze).”

“He is wealthy, yet a man of a samurai mind. He has a deep understanding of the hardships of the wandering journey, for he himself had traveled often to the capital city. He invited me to stay at his place as long as I wished and made me comfortable in every way he could.”

Making coolness
My lodging,
I rest

Yes (Hai), crawl out!
Croaking toad
Under the silk moth hut

The mental image of
Mayahuki (an eye brush)
And Benihana (Safflower, red powder flower)

Notes on Translation

Obanazawa (尾花沢), literally means the valley of the yellow iris (尾花). The city is located along the Mogami River in central Japan, halfway between Sendai and Sakata (Stages 18 and 31).

In Obanazawa, Matsuo Basho’s host was Seifu (清風), a wealthy merchant and poet of the Danrin school, founded by Nishiyama Sōin (1605 to 1682). Seifu had previously exchanged haiku with Basho and Sora in Edo. Seifu is the Haiku name of Michisuke Suzuki, a safflower wholesaler, thus the third haiku.

Who knows,
Seifu’s kaiku
Not me, not you

Seifu’s haiku
Faded
Like Safflower powder

Bashō no yōna

I have not been able to find any haiku by Michisuke Suzuki, or Seifu. But, there is a Seifu Museum in Obamazawa.

Safflower (紅粉の花, benibana or beni no hana), has been used in Japan as a source for red tint in cosmetics and dye for clothing. The yellow flower contains a concentrated tinge of red.

Watch a short Japanese film on Benihana.

With the July heating up, and the long walk, Basho and Sora were ready for a rest. The WKD Archive site indicates that Basho stayed at a nearby temple and not with Seifu. Perhaps, Seifu was not as “cool” as his name suggests.

From the second haiku, one infers that Basho’s host also maintained a nursery for Silkworm moths. Basho addresses a toad hidden in a Moth hut. It is hot and humid, Basho kindly commands him to crawl out, enjoy the cool, fresh air.

Mayahaki in the third haiku refers to the brush that sweeps the eye with red powder from the Safflower. It is the signature look of the Geisha.

Original Japanese

涼しさを我宿にしてねまる也

suzushisa o waga yado ni shite nemaru nari

這出よかひやが下のひきの声

hai ideyo kaiya ga shita no hiki no koe

まゆはきを俤にして紅粉の花

mayuhaki o omokage ni shite beni no hana