Fujiwara Teika (1162-1241)  is considered by many to be the preeminent Japanese poet.  As a poet, diarist and critic, his influence on premodern Japanese poetry is unsurpasssed.

His poetry specialized almost exclusively in the waka, the dominant lyrical form of the Japanese classical period, a five-line poem consisting of thirty-one syllables, arranged in measures of five syllables, then seven, five, seven, and seven.        

Touched by drizzling rain,
All around, the treetops
With their colours say
Autumn in evening is
A time of change, indeed.

                                     As I gaze out,
                                     Neither blossom nor Autumn leaves
                                     Are here;
                                     In a beachfront hut
                                     On an Autumn evening.

Fallen rain dripping
From the leaning eaves
So shallow that
Swiftly in pours
The moonlight.

                                Awaiting one whose
                                Path among the foothills
                                Has vanished, I think;
                                The cedar by my eaves
                                Is buried deep in snow.

Links:

A Prof studies this poet.

Various links and a good article.

His poems.

I am always on the lookout for poems that I like.  I find that Japanese poets often provide the succinct but poignant quality that appeals to me.  Here are some poems of Izumi Shikibu which I like.  I had never heard of this particular lady until somebody told me about her.  She lived around the year 1000 in Heian Japan and became one of the celebrated court ladies of this time, living an unconventional sort of life, taking many lovers and writing poetry.

Out of the dark,
Into a dark path
I now must enter:
Shine [on me] from afar
Moon of the mountain fringe

Another version (thanks to T):

                                                               The way I must enter

                                                                leads through darkness to darkness-

                                                                 O moon above the mountains’ rim,

                                                                  Please shine a little further

                                                                   on my path

                                             Is it only I
                                             Who will hold you in my thoughts?
                                              How terrible,
                                              That you, my destination
                                               Should not know at all.

In Autumn,
Unwracked by cares
The reed fronds too
Hang heavy at the tips
With dewfall upon them. 

                                                                        I’m at such a loss;
                                                                        Fireflies by the marsh:
                                                                        From my breast
                                                                        Wanders out
                                                                        My soul, or so it seems.
Folk their hearts
Exchange for love;
As moths
Plainly will be burnt,
Yet they see it not

                                               Related links:

Illustrations of the Illustrated Man

Poems of a Saikoku Pilgrimage

Translations from Japanese (Rexroth)

I thought that I might put some of my poems in some of my posts.  This is one:

Reflection

When you ponder the

Calendar of your days,

Do you recall the times

Of strife, of betrayal,

Of heartbreak?

Or…do you recall the

Quiet calm times filled

With beauty and tranquility?

Basho (Matsuo Kinsaku–ca. 1644-1694) was one of the most influential of the Japanese poets, famous for his hakai and clear haiku poems.  I first encountered him while reading some of his accounts of his wanderings across Japan in which he combined his description of the journey with his poetry (The Narrow Road to the Deep North). Check the links for more on the life of this wonderful man.  I will be adding some of my favorites of his poems in the days to come…

This first fallen snow
is barely enough to bend
the jonquil leaves

Into the ancient pond
A frog jumps
Water’s sound!

(see here for 30 translations of this poem, probably the most famous in Japan)

Breaking the silence
Of an ancient pond,
A frog jumped into water —
A deep resonance.

On a withered branch
a crow is perched:
an autumn evening.

Wikipedia article

A very readable account of his life…part of this wonderful site

Every May when the large rhododendron by the driveway begins to bloom, eventually producing this incredibly lovely display of pink blossoms that cover the entire plant, I begin to feel this tension. As I drive out every morning I stop and roll down my car window and look at the exquisite details in the pink flowers–the stamens, the pistil, the small brown speckles in the throat of the flower. At night when I return they seem to glow in the darkness welcoming me home.

And yet at the very height of the blooming period, I begin to experience a curious feeling of delight and apprehension. When I first felt this tension upon viewing the flowers, I was confused as to its origin. Why should I experience this sensation? Then as the blooming period reached its zenith and the flowers begin to turn brown and fall about the base of the huge plant, I understood. As I gazed on the brown withered blossoms clinging to the plant and strewn about the ground, I knew that the sweet, exquisite loveliness of the blossoms was transient, fleeting, and that soon they would wither and die. The presence of such exuberant life in sharp juxtaposition with decay and death produced this tension in me–produced a mixture of sweet melancholy and joy at the same time.

Upon reflection I realize that I have often had this particular feeling throughout my life. I remember once looking at the hand of a girl that I was holding. Moonlight shown down on us, and as I looked at her hand in mine, I thought of the beauty of the smooth flesh and how soon it would in the not too distant future become wrinkled and old before it eventually turned to dust. I became filled with a sense of how transient life was and a sadness filled me. “Bones,” I muttered which caused her to jerk her hand back in surprise.

I felt the same emotion reading war time letters from my father to his family and looking at photographs of him and my mother during that turbulent time. I felt it especially strong looking at photographs of my father and his best friend. They had grown up together in a small Texas town, gone to the same schools, played football on the same team. This friend had a car and would carry my father and my mother about during their courtship. They both had graduated on a Friday and both went into the military service on Monday–my father into the Army-Airforce, and his best friend into the Marines. I used to look at their picture together standing in front of my father’s house with their arms on each other’s shoulders —two young men with all their lives ahead of them.  My father lived through the war and now has children, grandchildren and great grandchildren and is still alive and healthy today at age eighty-three. His friend? He died a hero’s death at Iwo Jima and was awarded the Navy Cross. He lies in the black sands of that bloody island far from the dusty west Texas town in which he grew up.  Youth, promise…transience…

There were many other times that I felt this melancholy, this sadness, and I was surprised to learn that the Japanese had already recognized this emotion centuries ago and had even applied a term to it: “mono no aware” (AH-wah-reh, three syllables, with the accent on the first). “The phrase is derived from the word aware, which in Heian Japan meant sensitivity or sadness, and the word mono, meaning things, and describes beauty as an awareness of the transience of all things, and a gentle sadness at their passing.” This sense of the precariousness of life and the certainty of its passing permeates Japanese art, poetry, music and religion.

4October2007, 9:37 pm