Basho's thoughts on...

• Woman Central
• Introduction to this site
• The Human Story:
• Praise for Women
• Love and Sex in Basho
• Children and Teens
• Humanity and Friendship
• On Translating Basho
• Basho Himself
• Poetry and Music
• The Physical Body
• Food, Drink, and Fire
• Animals in Basho
• Space and Time
• Letters Year by Year
• Bilingual Basho 日本語も
• 芭蕉について日本語の論文
• Basho Tsukeku 芭蕉付句
• BAMHAY (Basho Amazes Me! How About You?)
• New Articles


Matsuo Basho 1644~1694

The only substantial
collection in English
of Basho's renku, tanka,
letters and spoken word
along with his haiku, travel
journals, and essays.

The only poet in old-time
literature who paid attention with praise
to ordinary women, children, and teenagers
in hundreds of poems

Hundreds upon hundreds of Basho works
(mostly renku)about women, children,
teenagers, friendship, compassion, love.

These are resources we can use to better
understand ourselves and humanity.

Interesting and heartfelt
(not scholarly and boring)
for anyone concerned with
humanity.


“An astonishing range of
social subject matter and
compassionate intuition”


"The primordial power
of the feminine emanating
from Basho's poetry"


Hopeful, life-affirming
messages from one of
the greatest minds ever.

Through his letters,
we travel through his mind
and discover Basho's
gentleness and humanity.

I plead for your help in
finding a person or group
to take over my 3000 pages of Basho material,
to edit and improve the material, to receive 100%
of royalties, to spread Basho’s wisdom worldwide
and preserve for future generations.

Quotations from Basho Prose


The days and months are
guests passing through eternity.
The years that go by
also are travelers.



The mountains in silence
nurture the spirit;
the water with movement
calms the emotions.


All the more joyful,
all the more caring


Seek not the traces
of the ancients;
seek rather the
places they sought.



Basho Spoken Word


Only this, apply your heart
to what children do


"The attachment to Oldness
is the very worst disease
a poet can have."


“The skillful have a disease;
let a three-foot child
get the poem"


"Be sick and tired
of yesterday’s self."


"This is the path of a fresh
lively taste with aliveness
in both heart and words."
.

"In poetry is a realm
which cannot be taught.
You must pass through it
yourself. Some poets have made
no effort to pass through, merely
counting things and trying
to remember them.
There was no passing
through the things."


"In verses of other poets,
there is too much making
and the heart’s
immediacy is lost.
What is made from
the heart is good;
the product of words
shall not be preferred."


"We can live without poetry,
yet without harmonizing
with the world’s feeling
and passing not through
human feeling, a person
cannot be fulfilled. Also,
without good friends,
this would be difficult."


"Poetry benefits
from the realization
of ordinary words."


"Many of my followers
write haiku equal to mine,
however in renku is the
bone marrow of this old man."


"Your following stanza
should suit the previous one as an expression
of the same heart's connection."


"Link verses the way
children play."


"Make renku
ride the Energy.
Get the timing wrong,
you ruin the rhythm."


"The physical form
first of all must be graceful
then a musical quality
makes a superior verse."

"As the years passed
by to half a century.
asleep I hovered
among morning clouds
and evening dusk,
awake I was astonished
at the voices of mountain
streams and wild birds."


“These flies sure enjoy
having an unexpected
sick person.”



Haiku of Humanity


Drunk on sake
woman wearing haori
puts in a sword


Night in spring
one hidden in mystery
temple corner


Wrapping rice cake
with one hands she tucks
hair behind ear


On Life's journey
plowing a small field
going and returning


Child of poverty
hulling rice, pauses to
look at the moon


Tone so clear
the Big Dipper resounds
her mallet


Huddling
under the futon, cold
horrible night


Jar cracks
with the ice at night
awakening



Basho Renku
Masterpieces

With her needle
in autumn she manages
to make ends meet
Daughter playing koto
reaches age seven


After the years
of grieving. . . finally
past eighteen
Day and night dreams of
Father in that battle


Now to this brothel
my body has been sold
Can I trust you
with a letter I wrote,
mirror polisher?


Only my face
by rice-seedling mud
is not soiled
Breastfeeding on my lap
what dreams do you see?



Single renku stanzas


Giving birth to
love in the world, she
adorns herself



Autumn wind
saying not a word
child in tears


Among women
one allowed to lead
them in chorus


Easing in
her slender forearm
for his pillow


Two death poems:


On a journey taken ill
dreams on withered fields
wander about

Clear cascade -
into the ripples fall
green pine needles




basho4humanity
@gmail.com




Plea for Affiliation

 

Plea For Affiliation

 

I pray for your help

in finding someone
individual, university,

or foundation - 
to take over my

3000 pages of material,   
to cooperate with me 

to edit the material,
to receive all royalties 

from sales, to spread

Basho’s wisdom worldwide,
and preserve for

future generations.


basho4humanity

@gmail.com

 



Home  >  Topics  >  Bilingual Basho 日本語も  >  H-16


Her Life-Force

彼女の勢力

Legend:
Words of Basho in bold
Words of other poets not bold

 Glaring about / she orders the children /  to “behave!” / While roasting bean paste / some ash she puffs away // 行儀能 よく せよと子供をねめ廻し / 焼き味噌の灰吹きはらいつつ

 

In his final spring, Basho follows a stanza by Yaba: 

 

Glaring about,
    she orders the children
      to “behave!”
While roasting bean paste
some ash she puffs away

 


Basho Renku Zenchuukai, volume 9, p. 177 芭蕉連句全注解、9 巻: 177

 

21 行儀能 よく せよと子供をねめ廻し                                     野坂

       「ねめ廻し」は睨み廻し、ある方向から別の方向を見つめる。

       悪戯子供達を睨め廻して、行儀よくして居れと躾する母

 

      Neme-mawashi = nirame-mawashi, to stare fiercely in one direction then another.

A mother glares at her mischievous children spread about the room and orders them to behave themselves.

 

22    やき味噌の灰吹きはらいつつ                                         芭蕉

        焼き味噌の灰をふくはらいながら、台所から子供達を にらんで行儀を仕付けているのは、農家でもあろうか

 

睨みながら注文している間、彼女は噌玉の串焼きの

おかず作り味噌の串の灰をふかしている。

                While she glares and orders, she puffs the ash

from the miso she is roasting on skewers to make a side dish 

 

Gyougi you / se yo to kodomo o / neme-mawashi         Yaba
Yaki miso no hai /fuki-harai-tsutsu                          Basho

 

 


Yaba has children scattered about the room, so mother has to “glare about” (neme-mawashi short for nirame-mawashi, to stare fiercely in one direction then another) to address them all – not that they listen. The stanza abounds with human activity in three lively active verbs – “glaring about,” “ordering” and her spoken command “behave – plus all the activities of the children: arguing, fighting, climbing, breaking or swallowing things, crawling or running about, this winter day in 17th century Japan.


To this abundance of living activity, Basho adds Mother broiling balls of soy bean paste on skewers to make a side dish. A bit of ash from the fire has gotten on the sticky miso. While she orders her kids to behave, she brings the skewer close to her mouth, purses her lips, and exhales a short burst of air at the ash to propel it off the miso. The astonishing delicacy of this action even the fingers of elves could not perform is the polar opposite of her glaring and shouting at her kids. Both ordering and puffing are her breath, her life force, her prana. This divine energy enters her body through inhalation and returns to the universe through exhalation. As Mother gave birth to these children, now she gives breath to the food that will nourish them.


Basho does something no other male poet does: he portrays the activity of an ordinary (not royal or in any way special) woman, with no adult male presence, no romance or sex, no suffering or dying, no causing of problems for men to solve. She simply is ALIVE and expresses her life-force as positive, whole, and iconic. Mother restores her inner peace by puffing away the ash from her spirit. Because the words are so ordinary and natural, her situation with her kids so common in our own world, we feel her reality. We connect with this mother, and as we breathe, we transcend space and time to be with her, to share prana with her, to puff away our own anger and establish harmony within.

 

野坂には子供たちが部屋のあちこちに散らばっているので、母親は子供たち全員に 話しかけるために「ねめ廻し」

(睨み廻し、ある方向から別の方向を見つめる)を しなければなりません。この句は、3 つの活発な動詞で人間の動作 — 睨み廻し」、 命令する、そして彼女の話し言葉、17 世紀の日本のこの冬の日、振る舞う - に 満ちています。

 

それに加えて、子供たちのすべての活動:議論、戦い、登る、壊す、 飲み込む、這う、走り回る」。 この豊富な生活活動に、芭蕉は母親の味噌玉の串焼きのおかず作りを添えています。 粘り気のある味噌にいろりからの灰がすおしついています。子供たちに行儀よくする ように命じる間、彼女は串を口に近づけ、唇をすぼめ、味噌についた灰をのけるため にかるく息を吹きかけます。エルフの指でさえ実行できなかったこの行動の驚くべき 繊細さは、彼女の子供たちへの「ねめ廻し」と叫びの正反対です。母の言いつけと かるい息き使いの両方が彼女の呼吸、生命力、ヨガのプラーナです。この神聖なエネ ルギーは、吸入によって彼女の体に入り、呼気によって宇宙に戻ります。母がこれら の子供たちを出産したとき、今、彼女は子供たちに栄養を与える食べ物に息を吹き込 みます。

 

芭蕉は他の男性詩人にはないことをしている:彼は普通の(王族でも特別で もない)女性の活動を描写しており、成人男性の存在、恋愛や性別、苦しみや死がな い。彼女は単に生きていて、彼女の生命力を前向きで、全体的で、象徴的なものとし て表現しています。母は精神から灰を吹き飛ばすことによって彼女の内なる平和を回 復します。言葉はとても普通で自然なので、彼女の子供たちとの状況は私たちの世界 ではとても一般的であり、私たちは彼女の現実を感じます。私たちはこの母親とつな がり、呼吸しながら、空間と時間を超越して、彼女と一緒にいて、プラーナを彼女と 共有し、私たち自身の怒りを吹き飛ばし、内なる調和を確立します。 


Basho wrote hundreds of poems about women and children, about friendship, love, and compassion, possibly the most pro-female, child-centered, and life-affirming works in world literature.

 

女性と子供達、友人や愛や同情をかんじて、 何百もの句を残し心暖かい芭蕉を広く公開しましょう。

最高の女性の味方、子供目線、そして人生の応援歌ではないでしょうか

 

For a menu of 300 Basho articles, see

www.basho4humanity.com/topic-description.php?ID=1525955995

 

For the entire series of Bilingual Essays,see

www.basho4humanity.com/topic-category.php?Cat=15

 

For “Letters from Basho” including translation of 60 letters, see

www.basho4humanity.com/topic-category.php?Cat=14

 

For Basho’s ultimate masterpiece, the tanka SPRING PASSES BY, see

www.basho4humanity.com/topic-description.php?ID=1525958016

 

Feedback will be greatly appreciated: basho4humanity@gmail.com 





<< To Quiet Down the Heart (H-15) (H-17) To Give Birth >>


The Three Thirds of Basho

 

 

I plead for your help in finding a person or group to take over my 3000 pages of Basho material, to edit and improve the presentation, to receive all royalties from sales, to spread Basho’s wisdom worldwide and preserve for future generations.

 

basho4humanity@gmail.com
Basho's thoughts on...

• Woman Central
• Introduction to this site
• The Human Story:
• Praise for Women
• Love and Sex in Basho
• Children and Teens
• Humanity and Friendship
• On Translating Basho
• Basho Himself
• Poetry and Music
• The Physical Body
• Food, Drink, and Fire
• Animals in Basho
• Space and Time
• Letters Year by Year
• Bilingual Basho 日本語も
• 芭蕉について日本語の論文
• Basho Tsukeku 芭蕉付句
• BAMHAY (Basho Amazes Me! How About You?)
• New Articles


Matsuo Basho 1644~1694

The only substantial
collection in English
of Basho's renku, tanka,
letters and spoken word
along with his haiku, travel
journals, and essays.

The only poet in old-time
literature who paid attention with praise
to ordinary women, children, and teenagers
in hundreds of poems

Hundreds upon hundreds of Basho works
(mostly renku)about women, children,
teenagers, friendship, compassion, love.

These are resources we can use to better
understand ourselves and humanity.

Interesting and heartfelt
(not scholarly and boring)
for anyone concerned with
humanity.


“An astonishing range of
social subject matter and
compassionate intuition”


"The primordial power
of the feminine emanating
from Basho's poetry"


Hopeful, life-affirming
messages from one of
the greatest minds ever.

Through his letters,
we travel through his mind
and discover Basho's
gentleness and humanity.

I plead for your help in
finding a person or group
to take over my 3000 pages of Basho material,
to edit and improve the material, to receive 100%
of royalties, to spread Basho’s wisdom worldwide
and preserve for future generations.

Quotations from Basho Prose


The days and months are
guests passing through eternity.
The years that go by
also are travelers.



The mountains in silence
nurture the spirit;
the water with movement
calms the emotions.


All the more joyful,
all the more caring


Seek not the traces
of the ancients;
seek rather the
places they sought.



Basho Spoken Word


Only this, apply your heart
to what children do


"The attachment to Oldness
is the very worst disease
a poet can have."


“The skillful have a disease;
let a three-foot child
get the poem"


"Be sick and tired
of yesterday’s self."


"This is the path of a fresh
lively taste with aliveness
in both heart and words."
.

"In poetry is a realm
which cannot be taught.
You must pass through it
yourself. Some poets have made
no effort to pass through, merely
counting things and trying
to remember them.
There was no passing
through the things."


"In verses of other poets,
there is too much making
and the heart’s
immediacy is lost.
What is made from
the heart is good;
the product of words
shall not be preferred."


"We can live without poetry,
yet without harmonizing
with the world’s feeling
and passing not through
human feeling, a person
cannot be fulfilled. Also,
without good friends,
this would be difficult."


"Poetry benefits
from the realization
of ordinary words."


"Many of my followers
write haiku equal to mine,
however in renku is the
bone marrow of this old man."


"Your following stanza
should suit the previous one as an expression
of the same heart's connection."


"Link verses the way
children play."


"Make renku
ride the Energy.
Get the timing wrong,
you ruin the rhythm."


"The physical form
first of all must be graceful
then a musical quality
makes a superior verse."

"As the years passed
by to half a century.
asleep I hovered
among morning clouds
and evening dusk,
awake I was astonished
at the voices of mountain
streams and wild birds."


“These flies sure enjoy
having an unexpected
sick person.”



Haiku of Humanity


Drunk on sake
woman wearing haori
puts in a sword


Night in spring
one hidden in mystery
temple corner


Wrapping rice cake
with one hands she tucks
hair behind ear


On Life's journey
plowing a small field
going and returning


Child of poverty
hulling rice, pauses to
look at the moon


Tone so clear
the Big Dipper resounds
her mallet


Huddling
under the futon, cold
horrible night


Jar cracks
with the ice at night
awakening



Basho Renku
Masterpieces

With her needle
in autumn she manages
to make ends meet
Daughter playing koto
reaches age seven


After the years
of grieving. . . finally
past eighteen
Day and night dreams of
Father in that battle


Now to this brothel
my body has been sold
Can I trust you
with a letter I wrote,
mirror polisher?


Only my face
by rice-seedling mud
is not soiled
Breastfeeding on my lap
what dreams do you see?



Single renku stanzas


Giving birth to
love in the world, she
adorns herself



Autumn wind
saying not a word
child in tears


Among women
one allowed to lead
them in chorus


Easing in
her slender forearm
for his pillow


Two death poems:


On a journey taken ill
dreams on withered fields
wander about

Clear cascade -
into the ripples fall
green pine needles




basho4humanity
@gmail.com




Plea for Affiliation

 

Plea For Affiliation

 

I pray for your help

in finding someone
individual, university,

or foundation - 
to take over my

3000 pages of material,   
to cooperate with me 

to edit the material,
to receive all royalties 

from sales, to spread

Basho’s wisdom worldwide,
and preserve for

future generations.


basho4humanity

@gmail.com