TWO HUNDRED SELECTED HAIKU MATSUO
MATSUO BASHO - Translated by Dr Tim Chilcott. 10,11,12.
Dear friends,
Get your coffee ready, sit back, relax and prime your heart to receive some Basho. There is nothing like it. Enjoy.
10 [1681] Feelings in my grass-thatched hut basho nowaki shite / tarai ni ame o / kiku yo kana NOTE [banana-plant windstorm doing / tub in rain (acc.) / hear night!] banana tree in windstorm, a night of listening to rain dripping in a tub
NOTE: The first line of this haiku has, unusually, seven syllables, which are duplicated in the translation. There are differing views about whether the tub was outside (to wash in, to catch rainwater) or inside (to stop a leak inundating the hut).
11 [1681-3] The bravery of the noonflower nuki no waka wa / hirugao karenu / hikage kana [snow's within as for / noon-face not wither / sunlight!] even in the snow the noonflower does not wither - the light of the sun
12
[1683]
ganjitsu ya / omoeba sabishi / aki no kure
[year's first day! / when-think lonely / autumn's evening]
the new year's first day! ...
yet I pensive and lonely
like autumn's eveningBusy week ahead. Wish me luck.
Bee well,
Xanda
Please Please Pease STOP with the syllable-counting... It's NOT the point it's NOT the form that "counts" it's the CONTENT/MEANIG -
with much appreciation for your obvious intent, but a bit saddened by the shameful lack of study -
thank you
-brett
The first one (banana tree) is intriguing. Unless I miscount, the first line effectively does have FIVE syllables in Japanese (bah - show -- know -- waksh -- tay). Alas, there are seven in English. It would seem silly and antagonistic to the spirit of the poem to offer something like: "Fruit tree in windstorm," simply to get five syllables.
The second haiku invites (1) a question as well as (2) a possible rewording. (1) Is the "wa" ( here used as the "particle," as for) of the first line counted as a syllable, or is there further elision (nu -- key -- no -- wak' -- wa)? (2) One might get back to seven (in English) in the second line by either deletion of the article or an apostrophe: The noonflow'r does not wither OR Noon flower does not wither (which I prefer).
Then there is the last one, which seems to have only FOUR syllables in the first line of the Japanese. [The second line has seven: o -- mo -- ae -- ba -- sah -- bee -- she]. And I wonder whether the English might read:
The new year's first day:
I am {or perhaps, "Finds me"?) pensive and lonely
Like autumn's evening.
Thank you very much for sharing these gems with us, Xanda. They are SO difficult, and this must truly be a labor of love.