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.
The moon clear – attendant to a child scared by a fox
The standard meaning for the word chigo is infant or small child, and in this collectionBasho, as well as Sei Shonagon and Chigetsu, use it this way. Scholars however tell us that, in poetry, a chigo was the ‘boy lover’ of a pedophile; when the fox howls the boy clings to the man – the point of the verse, according to the scholars, being the man’s feeling for the boy. If it were true that Basho in his final poem on children advocated men having sex with young boys, then most of us would agree he was no spokesman for
children’s rights.
HOWEVER THERE IS NO WORD OF SEXUAL CONTENT ANYWHERE IN BASHO’S VERSE.
This haiku speaks only of: 1) the moon, 2) a fox, 3) a child, 4) being scared, and 5) an attendant.
All the rest we add in ourselves. Scholars assume that Basho was using the word chigo the way they use it – but I rather assume that Basho’s thoughts went deeper than theirs. Scholars do not think much about ordinary children growing up – but Basho did in so many verses the scholars ignore. Translating chigo as
‘boy-lover’ narrows the verse to a small group of men and boys. The way Basho wrote it, the verse applies to ANY child, boy or girl, and the attendant can be man, woman or older child – or the moon is the attendant. The choice is ours: does Basho’s final verse about children describe deviant male behavior, or the
universal need in children for a trustworthy and supportive companion?
The road is dark and in the cold moonlight even familiar things become fearsome shadows. Foxes in Japanese folklore bewitch people and make them do evil. The years have taught Basho that the fox’s howl is only the cry of another being lonely in the night – but how can a child know this? When things get scary,
every child needs someone bigger who can be trusted.
Some translators appear to believe that tomo in this verse is the character 友, ‘friend’ as in tomodachi, which encourages the sexual-friend interpretation. Basho however wrote it with the character 供for one who ‘attends, serves, takes care of, looks after.’ Sam Gamgee was Frodo’s attendant. Fans of
the Lord of the Rings agree that the most inspiring element in that epic is the heroic bravery of Sam in supporting Frodo through all they suffered. The attendant must struggle to maintain the strength and clarity to attend the hero. Near the end of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, Sam comes close to succumbing:
…the night-sky was still dim and pale. There, peeking among the clock wrack above a dark tor high up in the mountains, Sam saw a white star twinkle for a while. The beauty of it smote his heart, as he looked up out of this forsaken land, and hope returned to him. For like a shaft, clear and cold, the thought pierced him that in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty forever beyond its reach.
Tolkien sees the small and meek draw power and hope from the distant star, as the child in this Basho verse does from the moon.
Child of poverty hulling rice, pauses to looks at the moon
Leonard Shlain, in his book Sex, Time, and Power proposes that the human concept of ongoing time originated in a prehistoric woman from two clues: the cycle of the moon together with the cycle of her menses. She needed the two clues, one inside her body and one in the greater world, to realize that time continues, and this realization led to all human culture and technology. Basho recognizes the clue in the moon: as we observe Luna, learning how she changes her shape and schedule from night to night, in
stages that remain the same month after month forever, we learn the nature of Time; as Shlain puts it, we “see beyond the moon to the next month.” He says,
“A magical moment occurs in every child’s life when he or she realizes that the moon is the child’s personal companion! As we move through the night time landscape, approaching objects glide by and then recede in the distance behind us. Not so the distant moon, which always keeps pace rice alongside us… There is something vaguely comforting, especially to a small child who has a natural fear of the dark, in knowing that the moon is a reliable and faithful companion that will not only light the child’s way but also be a steadfast companion during night time excursions.
Basho in just six words creates an epic confrontation; the child poised in the center of the verse between two eternal forces: fear of the Unknown on one side and Clear Light on the other. The verse is a profound work of deep relevance to all children and all those who care for children (because there is nothing sexual
going on between the attendant and the child). In order for the verse to empower children, we focus on its expression of the clarity of the trustworthy and supportive attendant.
Records from 8th Century Japan tell of people facing the rising full moon, clapping their hands twice before their faces, to worship the Buddha. By Basho’s time, nono-sama was a child’s name for both Moon and Buddha. Grandmothers taught their little grandchildren to bow and pray to nono-sama as the Moon rose into the sky. The folksong Nono-sama originated within the Pure Land sects whose kindergartens still teach it to small children.
Non-no Nono-sama Buddha May I be gently hugged to the chest of Mother I love, O Buddha. Non-no Nono-sama Buddha May I be firmly held by the hand of Father I love, O Buddha Non-no Nono-sama Buddha As the holy lantern rises we see the clear shining halo of Buddha
The song – like Basho poetry – focuses on body parts, physical action, and human affection. Both Mother hugging and Father holding are “attendants” to the child. The Buddha is usually depicted in paintings and sculpture with a halo around his head – and this halo is the Moon.
Here as he approaches his own death and merging with the infinite, Basho offers an “attendant” to walk along with the child on the path to knowledge: a man, woman, or older child as clear and trustworthy as the
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.
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.
