Summer— Mornings in Golden, Colorado, sitting outside, sipping coffee with nothing to do.
Mornings with nothing —
to do but sipping coffee
then waiting for noon
.
With nothing to do —
A breeze stirs my thoughts into
— haiku about nothing
.
Something
from nothing- haiku
Who knew?
Matsuo Basho must have wondered what his legacy would be. I suppose...
I suppose
I’ll fade as all flowers
and poets do
.
as clouds that gather
and dissipate
in the summer heat
.
as thoughts
that cross one’s mind
from time to time
.
one forgets
when one is done
I suppose
— Bashō no yōna, thinking about Matsuo Basho
sigh, this summer grass
is all that remains
— a mighty samurai’s dreams
.
natsukusa ya
tsuwamono domo ga
yume no ato.
夏草や兵共がゆめの跡
Hiraizumi, Iwate prefecture
Summer 1689
Like swallows, like the stork, like the Monarch butterfly, in summer, man migrates from home to vacation and suffer the heat. Matsuo Basho did not invent summer travel in Japan, but he did popularize it. His travelogues, a combination of haiku and commentary on local scenes were published during and after his lifetime. Highways were built.* Way stations were maintained and rest-stops and inns were conveniently located at distances of 20 miles apart.
Along the Oku no Hosomichi, Basho’s journey into Japan’s northern interior in the summer of 1689.
At Hiraizumi, the northernmost point on Basho’s journey that one day would be called Oku no Hosomichi, Basho detoured to the land where the Oshu Fujiwara clan prospered for three generations in the late Heian period (Heian, meaning peace, 794 to 1185).
Here, Minamoto no Yoshitsune, the third generation of the powerful Minamoto clan, fled fleeing the fickle emperor for whom he had gallantly fought but now was condemned. Far to the north, surrounded by mountains, to Hiraizumi he fled. Given refuge, he lived in peace, until the death of his protector whose son betrayed vilely him. In a final battle, Yoshitsune met his end.
Standing on the hill, in the midst of the dying summer grass, there Yoshitsune’s forces fought to the last man.
What do you think?
Grass as a metaphor for a dead warrior
Basho’s thoughts: “Three generations of glory of the Fujiwara clan vanished like a dream; the hills and rivers remain unchanged, as they were in the past.” How Dao, death comes to us all, and Nature reclaims everything, in the passage of time, restoring what is to the way it once was.
“Cry out,” a voice said,
And said I, “What shall I cry?”
“Our flesh is like grass, its beauty like the flower of the field…
The grass withers, the flower fades.”
Isaiah, 40:6–8
“I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love,
If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles.”
Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass, 1855
Note. Five Routes established by the Tokugawa shogunate. The Nakasendo and Tokaido were the most popular. Both connected Edo and Kyoto, the Nakasendo through the mountains, Tokaido along the coast. The Japanese artist Utagawa Hiroshige immortalized the “55 Stations of the Tokaido” in print.
Thoughts on James Baldwin’s letter to his nephew James (1962).
I have begun this thought five times,
This is the sixth and last,
Or is it?
Or is it? — Isn’t rewriting what is becoming? Matsuo Basho wasn’t born until he left home, quit as a servant, became a student in Kyoto, moved to Edo, and struck out across the Sumida River, writing, rewriting, finally becoming Basho.
One suspects in reading James Baldwin there is a great mixture of emotion, of hate, and disappointment, frustration at life, but buried at the bottom of this Pandora’s Box, is the hope of a better future. James, I hope, we have proven you right. I hope we are still trying.
Remembering most of mankind
Is not all mankind,
Is hope
.
What has been beaten into me
is to be tough and philosophical
Not bitter
.
Take no one’s word as the Word,
Including mine
Experience teaches
.
I left and came back
Because this is our home
Yours and mine
As bad as America was for James Baldwin (1924-1987), he realized that it had, for good and bad, was his home. Twenty six years in France gave him a good seat in the balcony to observe humankind. But back in America, he had family and friends. And though much of mankind was cruel, he had work to be done to make it better.
If one reads his writing, one can break it down, as I have attempted to do, into haiku.
Mornings in Golden, Colorado in June, 2925. Far from the madding crowds and the news.
Sitting on the porch
Musing while sipping coffee
Time seemingly stops
.
Cottonwood leaves shake
Like the silver tongue gossip
Whispering at dawn
.
The Gold is long gone
The wind the pine and the hills
Are all that remain
Golden, Colorado, June 2025
Far from the madding crowds, further still from the noise in the news that war is all that men know,
the hills repose beneath a pale blue sky while clouds move on,
Clear Creek flows on like a cool memory of times long forgotten,
and the cottonwoods whisper where the mines once churned out silver and gold.
.
Time drifts on,
not quite paradise, but close
To Heaven on Earth
Matsuo Basho is, for much of the time, an observer of nature. It is summer, we may assume, and the poet is in his garden tending his flowers and enjoying the butterflies. Perhaps, he is thinking of Zhuangzi’s butterfly, and dreaming he too is a butterfly. But along comes a gust of wind, and the butterfly flees for the protection of the willow tree.
each time the wind blows,
a butterfly flees my garden,
for a willow tree
— Matsuo Basho, Summer, year unknown
Japanese
| 吹くたびに | fuku tabi ni | each time the wind blows |
| 蝶のゐなほる | chô no inaoru, | a butterfly leaves my garden |
| 柳かな | yanagi kana | for a willow tree |
蝶のゐなほる, also, Chō no wi na horu; horu (abandons, leaves). Compare cho no niwa 蝶の庭, butterfly garden.
One can read more into this haiku. Sometimes a butterfly is an omen good luck. Sometimes it is a symbol of a dead person’s soul, more often it is simply a thing of joy, a fleeting moment of pleasure.
What is your take?
Matsuo Basho wrote this haiku in the summer of the 7th year of the Genroku era. It is 1694, the year Basho’s life would come to an end.
A spark of lightning
in my hands in the darkness
— this paper candle
.
稲妻を . 手にとる闇の . 紙燭哉
inazuma o . te ni toru yami no . shisoku kana
— Matsuo Basho, June (?), 1694
It was 1694, the last year of Matsuo Basho’s life. I suppose without knowing for sure, it was summer and raining. Matsuo Basho sat up late, writing by the light of a lamp. Perhaps, the lamp light went out, then lightning, then Basho lit a paper candle to find his way in the darkness.
For me, it is in the middle of June, early morning and raining. My dog Lucy hides in a corner in the closet, afraid of the thunder and lightning. Why, I wonder?
Gentle Reader:
You may disagree with my translation. You may draw other conclusions. This is reasonable for haiku are meant to be personal. Like the way my dog Lucy reacts to the lightning and thunder.
Inazuma (稲妻) translates to “lightning,” or “flash of lightning,” that is, the cosmic spark of divinity that lights up the sky at night. As a metaphor, it symbolizes the ability to cut through ignorance and delusion, the way a lightning bolt illuminates the darkness. Buddhism expresses the thought as a transitory moment. I see, but only for a moment.
Then comes the phrase te ni toru yami no (手にとる闇の) which means “take the darkness in your hands.” This is followed by shisoku kana (紙燭哉), meaning a small paper candle or torch. Lacking matches, the Japanese of Basho’s time, lit these paper candles from another source then carried them about to either light the way or illuminate a lamp.
As an aside, let me quote Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, who said, “Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.” So, dear friend, be the light and not the darkness.
When washing and drying are fun —
The mind churns
Jumbled, a washer mid-cycle
A mess
.
The mind tosses,
A dryer, half cycle,
Still wet
Bashō no yōna, with a little help from his daughter, November, 2024
A metaphor for how the mind works. About an idea half formed, about to become an epiphany. Eureka!
An idea half-formed,
About to become an Epiphany,
— Eureka!
Bashō no yōna, with a little help from his daughter, November, 2024
Thoughts on Washing and Drying
Matsuo Basho had no washer or dryer, just the river or the creek, just the branch and the wind. That way he was one with Nature. Are we losing it?
Specifically, the 山吹き yamabuki, a yellow flowering rose shrub that grows in thickets on a mountain slopes.
Matsuo Basho’s rose haiku (three versions) on a yellow rose written one year before his death. This is one of those times one says, “You had to be there.” One can not feel the mist on one’s face, see the petals lying scattered in the grass on the ground, or hear the roar of the waterfall. One can’t compete with Mother Nature.
Petals falling and scattering
From a yellow rose
To the noise of a waterfallYellow petals of a rose
tumbling to the thunder
of a waterfallPetal by petal
A Yellow Rose is falling
To the sound of the waterfallほろほろと 山吹ちるか 瀧の音
Horo horo to yamabuki chiru ka taki no oto
Matsuo Basho, 1693
Juliet says,
“A rose by any other name
would smell as sweet.”
William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet
Of course one is aware that a haiku takes a particular form of seventeen syllables, in three lines of five, seven, and five, whose goal is to evoke an image of the natural world that transcends a purely objective view. This does not prevent us from looking at other forms of literature as variations on the haiku. Here, for example is a truncated version of Victor Hugo’s poem, La tomb dit a la rose, a conversation between the grave and a rose.
The Grave says to the Rose
The grave to the rose:
– Why cry at dawn
Flower of love?
.
The rose to the grave:
What do you do with what falls
Into this bottomless abyss?
.
The rose: Dark crypt,
These tears are shed in the shadows
A perfume of amber and honey.
.
The grave: Wistful flower,
Each soul I take I make
— a heavenly angel!
— Victor Hugo, Poems, XXXI, 1888
The bald man’s lament:
Here no hair,
There no hair,
Hair today, Gone tomorrow
— Basho no Yona, Summer, 2024
Matsuo Basho gave us a more enduring image of a woman cooking dumplings while managing a loose strand of hair.
Holding a dumpling
in one hand, she tucks
her hair behind her ear.
Holding a dumpling in one hand,
The other hand, brushing back
A lock of her hair粽ゆう . 片手にはさむ . 額髪
Chimaki yuu . katate ni hasamu . hitaigami
–Matsuo Basho, May 5, 1691
Chimaki (rice dumpling) yuu (in the act of making) katate (with one hand) ni (in) hasamu (holding) hitaigami (hair on the forehead)
A man’s got to eat.
Chimaki, steamed dumplings, wrapped with leaves of bamboo, banana, etc., made of glutinous (sticky) rice and various fillers.
How do you like your dumplings? Add a filler of meat or vegetables, and sprinkle with a special sauce.
From spring to summer in 1690, Bashō was living in quiet retirement at a place called Genju-an (the Phantom Dwelling). It had been an abandoned hut beside Lake Biwa. What better place for one tired of travel, tired of guests, growing weary of the world.
Basho speaks:
“Ten years ago, I gave up city life, now I’m approaching fifty, like a bagworm without its bag, a snail without its shell. (On my recent travels,) the hot sun of Kisakata in Ou tanned and scorched my face. I’ve bruised my heels on the rough beaches of the northern sea where tall dunes make walking so hard. And now this year, I am drifting here by the waves, on the shores of Lake Biwa.”
Source. WKD
matsuo-basho-haiku 