Winter Wind

A cold wind blows, it snows and snows. Winter, 1690, Genroku, 3rd year. Matsuo Basho had completed the long journey, that would one day become known as Oku no Hosomichi, but he had not yet returned to Edo. The end is near.

Ah, the bitter winter wind,
my face, my swollen cheeks
are painful

こがらしや .　頬腫痛む .　人の顔
Kogarashi ya . hoobare itamu . hito no kao
— Matsuo Basho, Winter 1690

The order of the haiku was reversed to make sense. Hito no kao, the human face. Hoobare itamu, swollen cheeks are painful. Some pundits suggest that there was a mumps epidemic. I suggest, as anyone would know, who walks in the bitter wind, the cheeks were simply red and puffy.

**A winter’s journey on horseback**, Hiroshige, source Wikipedia

What is Haiku

“Haiku is a form of Zen.” — R. H. Blyth

Let’s not be wordy,
Precise, concise, shades of truth
Wisdom with few words

Ah — a verbal act
by defying convention
gets right to the point

A verbal act —
Frost, clinging to red roses —
Disappears like dew.

— Bashō no yōna, January 2026

Haiku draws on memory. It condenses and colors. It takes a scene and gives it meaning beyond its mere description. The last haiku was inspired by a red rose that still clung to a branch along Clear Creek in Golden, Colorado in December, 2025. I had just finished a three mile run up and back Clear Creek Trail. There was ice at the edge of the creek, but in the middle of the creek the water flowed smoothly and clear, like the name of the creek. The rose at the end of the run was like a medal, but one that would not last.

And, as my daughter say, you don’t always need to take a picture. Enjoy the moment. Remember it as a haiku and make it last.

Speaking of children. I was telling my son that one should write every day. Not only that but put it out for there where the world can take pot shots at it. Practice and feedback, it is how we get better. Contact, resistance, and repetition.

Practice and feedback
One gets better and better,
— a flint getting sharp.

Sake Anyone?

New Year’s Eve,
from dusk til dawn,
Sake anyone?
— Bashō no yōna, 2025

Eat drink and be merry, but there is hell to pay for a little buzz.

Like floating flowers
My sake is white,
My rice is black
花にうき世我が酒白く飯黒し
hana ni ukiyo waga sake shiroku meshi kuroshi
.
Cherry blossoms falling
Sneaking sips of sake
Behind a fan
扇にて酒くむ陰や散る桜
ōgi nite sake kumu kage ya chiru sakura
.
After drinking the sake
The bottle becomes
A flower vase
呑明て花生となる二升樽
nomi akete hana-ike ni sen nishoodaru
.
May swallows dance
but let not mud drop
in my sake cup
盃に泥な落しそ舞ふ燕
盃に泥な落しそ村ツバメ
sakazuki ni doro na otoshi so muratsubame
.
when I drink sake
no longer can I sleep
this snowy night
酒飲めばいとど寝られぬ夜の雪
sake nomeba itodo nerarenu yoru no yuki
— Matsuo Basho, sake haiku

I confess to liking the last haiku the best. Or maybe it is just that it resonates with me.

The more we drink, the less we sleep
nomeba itodo nerarenu

sake, the more one drinks, the less one sleeps

Snow upon snow

It is said to have been written in the first year of the Jokyo Era (貞享), 1684. A compilation of poems including Basho’s had been published called Shriveled Chestnuts. And Basho was on the road on the Five Highways on the first of his four major wanderings.

Snow upon snow
Tonight, the last month is December
Is there a full moon or not?

雪と雪 . 今宵師走の . 名月か
Yuki to yuki . Koyoi shiwasu no . Meigetsu ya
— Matsuo Basho

Version Two, when there is a glimmer of hope.

Snow upon snow
Tonight, the last month
Is there a sliver of a moon or not?

The Moon 月

It has been said that this haiku was written to settle a disagreement between two individuals (snow upon snow), each part frozen and unwilling to compromise. The moon was supposed to mediate the differences, but the cloudy weather and the snow got in the way. Tsuki is any moon. Meigtsu, refers to a full moon. A sliver of a moon (mikazuki) seems appropriate if we are trying to patch up differences.

雪と雪 . 今宵師走の . 名月か
Yuki to yuki . Koyoi shiwasu no . Meigetsu ya
image, Wikipedia

The Dao – Chapter One

man on a rock looking at the distant mountains

Matsuo Bashō, the 17th-century Japanese haiku poet, didn’t directly write about Daoism. But he did dabble in Buddhism. And he traveled, one imagines, searching for the Way. He died, on November 28, 1694, on the way to the Grand Shrine in Ise, but got no further than Osaka. He was only 50.

Way beyond words, go —
All things arise from one source,
Travel and behold.
— The Dao, as One

Hail

Lake Biwa at night
plucking the shamisen
the pounding hail
— Matsuo Basho, Fall, 1684

Lake Biwa / at night, the three string shamisen / sounding (like) the sound of hail
琵琶湖の / 夜や三味線の / 音あられ
Biwakō no / yo ya shamisen no / oto arare

Did he like it?

In the first year of the Jōkyō (1684), on the journey of Nozarashi Kiko, in Ogaki, near the waters of Lake Biwa, at a gathering at Nyogyō’s house, Nyogyō was invited to play a Japanese shamisen. (Background Source: Yamanashi-ken)

(Shamisen 三味線, a three string instrument that sounds something like a banjo.)

**琵琶湖の / 夜や三味線の / 音あられ**
**Biwakō no / yo ya shamisen no / oto arare**

Shigure!

Shigure!
be it rain or drizzle,
it’s bordering on freezing.
— Bashō no yōna, September 2025

In late autumn of the second year of Genroku, September 1690, Basho’s disciples (蕉門 shomon) gathered at an inn or tea house (亭 te) in Iga Ueno. As everyone waited for the hot tea, they shuffled their feet and rubbed their hands in the chilly inn, Basho remarked:

to everyone and even the inn,
the Autumn drizzle
is freezing

人々を . しぐれよ宿は . 寒くとも
Hitobito wo . Shigureyo yado wa . Samuku tomo
— Matsuo Basho, September 1690

Note. Basho had been gone from Edo now for a year. He had completed the long journey into the northern interior (Oku no Hosomichi) in the summer of 1689. He was now spending time traveling around editing his magnum opus, which would not be published until after his death.

The famous Mariko teahouse by Utagawa Hiroshige, Wikipedia

life’s journey

By the summer of 1694, Basho was not feeling well and he knew the end was near. As if to sum up his life, he wrote this haiku.

making my way in life,
in a small rice patch,
back and forth
.
世を旅に代かく小田の行戻り
yo o tabi ni shiro kaku oda no yuki modori
— Matsuo Basho, late summer, 1694

As you like it:

traveling this world,
a lifetime working a rice patch,
back and forth
— Bashō no yōna, Thoughts on Basho while walking, Summer 2025

世を旅に	Yo o tabi ni	making my way in life,
代かく小田の	shiro kaku oda no	in a small rice patch
行戻り	yuki modori	back and forth

Back and forth,
Sowing and reaping,
Seeking answers never found.
— Bashō no yōna, Thoughts on the Dao, 2025

Plum Rain

Japan’s rainy season is called “tsuyu” 梅雨. It occurs in June and July. Because the plum ripens at this time, the rainy season is also”meiyu” 梅雨. Basho is refering to the fact that sometimes the plums collect mildew and turn sour. The Ume fruit, or plum, is a popular summer fruit. and the riper it gets, the more sour.

Written in Kyoto, in the 7th year of the Kanbun era (1667), when the artist was 24 years old.

Ah, the sound of rain falling —
to the ears, it sounds sour
as it rains, the plum ripens

降る音や耳も酸うなる梅の雨
Furu oto ya mimi mo san unaru ume no ame
— the poet who one day become Matsuo Basho, 1667

The poet, then known as Tosei 桃青, meaning green peach.

How Tao

Let’s be honest
Let’s be real
We are lucky just to be
— Bashō no yōna, 2025

One who traveled as much as Matsuo Basho must have thought about the Tao de Ching, the Dao, the Way. The ways included the Nakasendo Way connecting Edo and Kyoto, the coastal route, called the Tokaido Way that would have taken Basho near his home. Then too there was the shorter Koshu Kaido, that was an alternative of the Nakasendo Way. Then too, Basho and a friend Sora made their own way through Japan’s northern interior and along both coasts. This was the famous Oku no Hosomichi, the book that made Basho famous.

Basho wrote the book, part travelogue, part haiku about his five month journey in the spring and summer of 1689. He spent the next five years editing it until his death in 1694. It was not published until 1702.

It is easier to write
Than edit,
Harder still to publish.

In the blink of an eye,
from here to there
and back again