It is now November. The sky is gray, the trees are bare, there is a cold wind that chills, leaves once red and gold, now yellow and brown, flutter in the air then gather for they know Winter is near.
Meoto Iwa Married Couple Rocks, Futami
September 1689, Ogaki
In September 1689, Matsuo Basho has completed his Journey to the North, ending in Ogaki on horseback. His friend Rotsu accompanied him, Sora, his companion on much of the journey, rejoined him. Basho continues, “we all went to the house of Joko, where I enjoyed a reunion with Zensen, Keiko and his sons, and many other old friends who came to see me by day or night.“
On the 6th of September, it was time to part and take to the road again. Life moves on, and so, he left for the Ise Shrine, for he wanted to see the dedication of a new shrine (Futamiokitama Shrine). As he stepped into the boat that would take him across Ise Bay he wrote:
As clams Divide into Two (Separate in Futami) In Autumn
蛤の ふたみにわかれ 行秋ぞ
hamaguri no / futami ni wakare / yuku aki zo
So too, I take to the road again. Not a farewell my friends, a repose.
Matsuo Basho (松尾 芭蕉) lived in the later half of the 17th century when Japan was isolated from Western culture and there was, of course, no Halloween, no Trick or Treat, no masked children laughing and singing, “Smell my feet, Give me something good to eat.” Masks were however used in the ceremonies of Shinto religion (Tengu, 天狗), the plays of Noh theater, and as part of the Samurai military costume.
Noh mask, 3 faces, Wikipedia
Basho’s Halloween Costume
Had he worn one, surely a banana , his self-given moniker, the very meaning of Basho (芭 蕉) and the plant which grew over his hut on the outskirts of Edo. Otherwise, a Noh mask, for Basho loved to attend the plays Lastly as an old and aged frog about to make a splash, for that was the poem that made him famous.
Old pond, frog jumping into water, sound
Furuike ya kawazu tobikomu mizu no oto
ふるいけやかわずとびこむみずのおと
Why is Basho’s frog haiku famous
Water makes many sounds, it ripples on the rocks, splatters as rain falling upon the roof, as the roar of the ocean waves, even the gurgle of water in a drain. But the very best has to be surprise when a frog disturbs the stillness of a pond and we hear kerplop!
Shoda Koho, Frog on Lotus Leaf, detail stylized, source ukiyo-e.org
The wintry wind, Swelling cheeks and throbbing pain on Peoples’ faces
Kogarashi ya/ Hoobare itamu/ Hito no kao
こがらしや 頬腫痛む 人の顔
Though we don’t know, let us imagine that the year is 1672, Basho at age 28, has moved to Edo (now Tokyo), the seat of the newly established Tokugawa shoguns. He is there to make his career as a professional haiku poet. Picture a street in Edo, it is winter, the trees have been striped of their leaves by a strong wind blowing out of the North. Men and women, old and young, pull up their collars and tighten their scarves and scurry down the street trying to avoid the bitter wind that bites their cheeks.
In the words of Lao Tzu, “Those who know do not speak. Those who speak do not know.” And those who feel know how truly cold it is. Normally, a face reveals nothing, but a bitterly cold wind reveals the pain one feels on a winter’s day.
Kogarashi is a marker for the start of the winter season. According to the Japan Meteorological Agency, the wind must blow from the north at a speed of 28.8 kph (18 mph) and be capable of stripping leaves from the tree.
1694, Genroku 7, on the 21st day of the ninth lunar month
An Autumn evening (sigh) Breaking down How will it end – (an angry) talk?
“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.” Translators, like Nick Carraway’s character in The Great Gatsby, never totally agreeing, trying to make sense of Matsuo Basho’s haiku. This however provides hours of fun and never-ending chatter, for when it comes to the sense of a poem, in Zen, there is no right or wrong.
How will it end – In pleasant chat or angry talk?
Three alternative translations
In the autumn night, Breaking into A pleasant chat
1694 – Basho is traveling again for the last time, going from the house of one friend to another. In the year 1694 (Genroku 7, on the 21st day of the ninth lunar month), shortly before his death, he arrives at the home of Shioe Shayo in Osaka. Old friends gathering, reciting haiku, and talking of the olden days.
One month later, on the 12th day of the tenth lunar month, he peacefully passed away.
Notes on Translation
秋の夜を 打ち崩したる 咄かな Aki no yo wo/ Uchikuzushitaru/ Hanashi kana
Line one. 秋の夜 をAkinoyo wo, An Autumn night. The final character を imparts the idea of a sigh or emphasis.
Line two. 打ち崩したるUchikuzushitaru, most translation agree that this conveys the meaning “breaking down into”. I imagine an evening that began as a Renga party where a group of poets each contributed a verse under the direction of a renga master, Matuso Basho. Each verse a haiku that contained three lines of five, seven, and five syllables. Eventually all games come to an end, breaking down into congenial chatter and sometimes anger.
Line three. 咄かな Hanashi kana. Basho leaves us with a bit of a mystery. After three centuries, Hanashi comes down to us as a talk, a story and a chat. But the character 咄 when repeated becomes a loud voice (onomatopoeia), especially in an angry way; like tut-tut or tsk-tsk. The final two characters かなkana express wonder.
If the evening ended in anger and disagreement, I imagine Basho sitting there, a bit groggy from the wine, shaking his head, sadly thinking, this is how it ends. Thankfully, I am in the minority on this point of view. A month later, on his death bed, Basho is pictured, at peace, surrounded by friends.
“Ignore the faults of others and be ignorant of your own virtues.”
Should I to say a word My lips turn cold In the autumn wind.
mono ieba / kuchibirusa samushi / aki no kaze
物いへば唇寒し龝の風
Autumn 1691
On his return to Edo in the autumn of 1691, Bashō took up the task of editing his journal that was to become The Narrow Road to the Interior (奥の細道, Oku no Hosomichi), which was published in 1694. He had a great many visitors and wrote to a friend, “I have no peace of mind.”
leaves, some the wind scatters on the ground; so too the race of men.
– Iliad vi.146
Marcus Aurelius, Roman emperor and Stoic philosopher, paraphrasing the Illiad, vi146, in his Meditations, 10.34.
Maple Leaves at Tsūtenkyō, near Kyoto
Matsuo Basho on Scattered Leaves
Let the universe be your companion, bearing in mind the true nature of things—mountains and rivers, trees and grass, and humanity – and enjoy the falling blossoms and scattered leaves.Matsuo Basho
Humanity, Basho observed, enjoys the true nature of things. Autumn leaves, falling leaves of red and gold, scattered leaves outside my window, written about in song and poem, a last hurrah, a winsome remembrance, before winter’s wind comes along.
Such things as these cherished tears coloring scattered maple leaves
尊がる涙や 染めて 散る紅葉 tootogaru namida ya somete chiru momiji
October 1, 1691, shortly before Basho, age 48, returned to Edo. Basho’s greeting to the priest Ryu at Menshooji temple 明照寺, (Meishōji), near Lake Biwa, in Hikone, Shiga Prefecture. WKD Matsuo Basho Archives
In the summer and fall of 1676, young Matsuo Chūemon Munefusa (he had not yet taken the pen-name Bashō) left Edo and returned to Iga to visit his family. The autumn moon rising over the mountains was a sight to behold.
Let us write poetry! the moon over the mountains is rarely seen in Edo
nagamuru ya Edo ni wa marena yama no tsuki
詠むるや江戸には稀な山の月
Hiroshige’s Moon over Mountain, 1835
Moon Viewing
Matsuo Chūemon Munefusa is 33, struggling to make a name for himself.
He has been living for four years in Edo’s fashionable and artsy Nihonbashi neighborhood. It is noisy, it is dirty, the lights obscure the moon. A autumn trip to his birthplace in Iga, Ueno provides an opportunity to see the harvest moon.
The last line, 山の月yama no tsuki, moon over the mountain. This refers to the Japanese custom of holding parties to see a full moon, called moon viewing. The most popular viewing is the harvest moon in mid-autumn, celebrated as Tsukimi.
Notes on Translation
読む nagamuru, reading, reading out loud, reciting.
稀な marena, rare or uncommon. Viewing the full moon in the crowded, dirty city of Edo was not a beautiful sight. Especially so, as young Matsuo was living in the bustling district of Nihonbashi, a kind of New York Times Square with all sorts of distractions.
kakitsubata – an iris brings to mind a hokku kakitsubata ware ni hokku no omoi ari 杜若われに発句のおもひあり
Kakitsubata
It is the fall and the iris blossoms though long gone, still bring to mind the memory of my grandmother, for it too was her favorite flower. For Matsuo Basho, flowers were an inspiration and he wrote of the kakitsubata, the blue water iris, at least three times. This one in 1685, following the death of his mother in 1683.
Basho’s haiku is based on the eighth century hokku and Noh play of Ariwara no Narihira.
In the play, a traveling monk seeing iris blossoms on the bank of a stream approaches to admire their beauty. It is strange to him how the flowers are incapable of knowing their own beauty. A young woman watching him studying the flowers approaches him. This place is called Yatsuhashi, she says, and it is famous for its irises. When he asks if they have been the subject of a poem, she tells him of the poet Ariwara no Narihira of the Heien Period who composed the poem, “Just as a karakoromo robe comfortably fits my body after wearing it a long time, I comfortably fit my wife. Alas, I came east, leaving her behind in Kyoto. It is heartbreaking to be so far apart.”
By 1685, Basho has become a tabi no kokoro 旅の心 literally “traveling heart”. His mother died in 1683 and the following year he left Edo on one of his first wanderings. In 1685, the year of this haiku, he presumably visited the famous Yatsuhashi Kakitsubata Gardens, which reminded him of the poet Ariwara no Narihira, who wrote a hokku (an introductory poem) and a Noh play based on the flower. The play is set in early summer, near Yatsuhashi (Eight bridges) in Mikawa Province, present Aichi Prefecture.
Kakitsubata, the hokku
Kakitsubata is a hidden word (the first two characters in the five lines) in the acrostic hokku (poem) by Ariwara no Narihira from Tales of Ise.
から衣 きつゝなれにし つましあれ ばはるばるきぬる たびをしぞ思
Ka-ragoromo kit-sutsu narenishi tsu-ma shi areba ha (ba)-rubaru kinuru ta-bi o shi zo omou
Notes on translation
Kakitsubata (Chinese, 杜若, Japanese, かきつばた) – one of three Japanese species of iris, is found along waterways and is usually purple or blue in color. In English it is sometimes translated as “rabbit-eared iris”. The kakitsubata is cultivate in the Yatsuhashi Kakitsubata Garden (八橋かきつばた園) at the Muryojuji Temple. It is also the place where Japanese poet Ariwara no Narihira was inspired to write his verse.
Hokku, 発句 – the opening stanza of a series of collaborative linked poems, renga.
Chiyo-Ni 千代尼 (1703-1775) was born in Matto, Kaga Province (now Ishikawa Prefecture), the daughter of a picture framer.
She began writing haiku at the age of seven, was apprenticed to two of Matsuo Basho’s disciples, and was quite popular as a poet by the age of 17. In 1720, she married into the Fukuoka 福岡某 family in Kanazawa, becoming the Lady Kaga no Chiyo, or Kaga no Chiyo Jo. Jo 女 meaning “woman”, signifying her status as poet. Within two years of her marriage, her infant son died, and then her husband. She returned home to care for her parents and run the family business.
In 1752 she became a nun and was henceforth known as Chiyo-Ni, Ni 尼 meaning “nun”.
He and she, she and he. Many haiku artists took up where Matsuo Basho left off with his death in 1694. One such artist was the Lady Kaga no Chiyo (Chiyo-ni, 1703 – 1775). She had taken up writing at the age of seven and was well-known by the time she was a teenager. Basho’s influence comes from the fact that she studied under two of Basho’s apprentices, but as seen in the following haiku, she spoke in her own unique voice.
Morning Glories Entwined in the bucket at the well So, I beg for water
Matsuo Basho, cooking his morning breakfast, observes:
Morning Glories, While cooking rice Am I a man, (I wonder)?
A moment in time
In a world of things, we strive to express our joy and wonderment in Nature’s beauty. Making his breakfast, Matsuo Basho watching the morning glory unfurl to catch the morning sun. Similarly, Chiyo-ni going to fetch water, finds that overnight the morning glory has wrapped its tendrils into the handle.
A word, a couplet, a line, a thought, nothing can compare with the actual moment in time for Nature’s beauty remains supreme.
Western translators have tried to fill out the meaning of the haiku adding words that were perhaps implied but not written. Dr. Gabi Greve, of the Daruma Museum, Japan, has given us many variations of Chiyo-ni’s haiku, adding neighbor to explain her solution to Chiyo-ni’s dilemma. While the English poet Edwin Arnold has expanded the original thought greatly:
The morning-glory Her leaves and bells has bound My bucket handle round. I could not break the bands Of these soft hands. The bucket and the well to her left, ‘Let me some water, for I come bereft.
This, I believe, has changed the game, for haiku was and is a game. The only rule being that the poet must express his or her thought in three lines of five, seven, and five syllables, features an image, or a pair of images, expressing the essence of a moment in time.
Morning Glories, Suzuki Kiitsu (1796–1858)
Notes on Translation
Both poets use the flower name 朝顔, asagao, literally morning face.
It is a flower of the fields and and hedge rows, often entwined with briars and along a fence or gate. The flower was brought to Japan with the advent of Buddhism. The tiny blue or purple flower that bloomed each morning represented enlightenment.
Sen no Rikyū, the 16th century tea master, is said to have grown gorgeous morning glories in the garden by his teahouse. Toyotomi Hideyoshi (1537 – 1598), Japan’s “Great Unifier,” sought an invitation to tea so that he could see the flowers.
釣瓶,tsurube, a bucket for drawing water at a well.
貰い水, morai mizu, literally, received I water – 貰 morai, can also suggest a tip or beneficence . 水 mizu, water. This leaves us with the impression that Chiyo must go and beg for water, i.e. “receiving water as a gift”.
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