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 aged nun tells / a story with feeling / Filled with pity / her message to rescue / abandoned child / A deer pulls the sleeve / of someone in the village 老尼はなしの / 叙ありけり / 哀余る / 捨て子ひろひに / 遣して
山の麓が / 外里に鹿 の / 裾 引 いる
芭蕉連句全註解, Complete Basho Renku Interpretations, vol. 2, p. 261
Rōni hanashi no / tsuide arikeri Yōsui
７４ 老尼はなしの / 叙ありけり 揚水
年取った尼僧がはずんだ声で物語を語った
The old nun told a story with feeling in her voice
Ai amaru / sutego hirohi ni / tsuawashite Bashō
７５ 哀余る / 捨て子ひろひに / 遣して 芭蕉
寺の外で捨てられた子を聞いて哀れあふれる, 子をひろうに人を遣わした。
Hearing a child abandoned outside the temple and filled with pity,
she sent someone to bring the child inside.
Soto sato ni shika no / suso hiite iru Kikaku
７６ 外 里 に 鹿 の / 裾 引 いる 其角
山の麓が村の人の袖を引いて捨て子のところへの案内して行いた。
A mountain deer pulls the sleeve of a village woman to bring her to the child.
Yosui offers an open space for Basho to fill in with a “narration” （叙） told by an aged nun; this word, according to the BRZ, requires Basho’s story to be hazunda, “lively.” Basho has the nun recall a night long ago when she heard a baby crying outside the temple gate, and sent a temple servant to bring the baby inside. Some in Buddhism tell us to let go of attachments and accept the passage of life and death – but Basho’s nun chose to forego that type of Buddhism and instead rescue a life. She generates a feminine Buddhism, based on compassion, “the virtue of empathy for the suffering of others.” She feels the glory of her deed, and we share her consciousness of that.
Kikaku takes “filled with pity” away from the aged nun, and re-directs it to a doe who found the abandoned child in the forest. Feeling compassion for this baby of another species but realizing the inability of her paws to comfort the baby, she walked, carrying compassion with her, to a nearby village where she chose a human being with a warm heart, and pulled on her sleeve – her “message to rescue.” So imagine yourself in the field, feeling a pull, turning around to see a doe with those luminous eyes, realizing that she wants you to go with her, following her into the forest, and finding an infant!
Kikaku, with an assist from Basho, scores a goal: he creates a new poetic world, in which compassion transcends the barriers between humanity and another species. This is renku at its zenith.
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.
