On Love and Barley: Haiku of Basho

I wish I could draw or paint.

Every time I read Basho's haiku I feel the urge to create (or recreate) the beauty I sense in his words.

Others have tried before me as the internet is full of such examples.

I've been wanting to get back into my cross-stitching for some time now and haven't felt inspired...perhaps I could try my hand at a haiku sampler with some simple blossoms or leaves as a border? 

I'm curious to discover what might be revealed when one sits for a period of time with just one haiku.

I recently read On Love and Barley - the Haiku of Basho translated by Lucien Stryk (1986).

During his lifetime (1644 - 94), Basho wrote over 1000 haiku.

This slim volume contains just 253 - a lovely accessible way to discover the beautiful simplicity of his life's work.

Zen, as an aesthetic, is something I feel very drawn to.

Basho aimed for the 'calm realisation of profoundly felt truths' according to Stryk in his Introduction.

Superficiality, trickery and artifice were to be avoided.

The solitary experience, lightness and honouring the humble were Basho's tools.

His inspiration was daily life, observation, stillness and nature.

Moments in time, 'distilled, snatched from time's flow' were enough.

8

Stryk provides the reader with some guidelines and explanation for the structural development of haiku: 'two elements divided by a break (kireji, or 'cutting word', best rendered in English by emphatic punctuation), the first element being the condition or the situation - 'Spring air' - the other the sudden perception, preceded by kireji (in these pieces a dash).

Spring air -

woven moon

and plum scent.

Basho encouraged muga, 'so close an identification with the things one writes of that self is forgotten.'

Zen philosophy was part of Basho's life but only occasionally was this specifically stated in his haiku.

 He preferred the reader to experience revelations through the things we know, like nature.

132

I have tried to source the original artist/s for the two haiku above, but get lost in a maze of pinterest pages each time.
I am happy to acknowledge the original artist if anyone can point me in the right direction.

On Love and Barley itself is dotted with black and white versions of original illustrations by Ike no Taiga (1723 -76) like the one below.

Untitled - Mountains (public domain)

Just Saying

This quote popped up on my facebook feed during the week. The problems of NOW have been swirling around in my brain ever since.

We are living in a culture entirely hypnotized by the illusion of time, in which the so-called present moment is felt as nothing but an infintesimal hairline between an all-powerfully causative past and an absorbingly important future. 

We have no present. 

Our consciousness is almost completely preoccupied with memory and expectation. We do not realize that there never was, is, nor will be any other experience than present experience. 

We are therefore out of touch with reality. 

We confuse the world as talked about, described, and measured with the world which actually is. We are sick with a fascination for the useful tools of names and numbers, of symbols, signs, conceptions and ideas.

― Alan W. Watts (Become What You Are, 1955)

I love the idea of NOW and being present in the moment. I've even managed to do so on many occasions. But I get confused about how reflection and planning fit into this idea of NOW.

The only place we can physically be is HERE & NOW, but we have minds. And those minds can wander off all over the place.

I feel that we should use those minds - to reflect on past mistakes, successes and problems to help us manage the stuff that pops up NOW. Those fickle minds can also help us plan for and imagine a future so that we can set up stuff NOW that might be useful later on. In another NOW.

Being HERE & NOW is peaceful, but is it practical?

We cannot relive our memories or inhabit the future, but can we not experience happiness NOW by remembering some of those sweet times past and dreaming about the ones to come?

If NOW is all we have, what's the point of having a memory and an imagination?

#justsaying

One Hundred Great Books in Haiku by David Bader

No time to read the classics?
Overwhelmed by all those pages?
Ye olde style language too much?

Then take a peek at Bader's haiku...100 classics converted into haiku.
A cheat-sheet with rhythm!



Pride and Prejudice

Single white lass seeks
landed gent for marriage, whist.
No parsons, thank you.

 

 

Bleak House

 

Fog, gloom, men in wigs -

the Chancery Court blights all.

See where law school leads?

 

 

 

Little Women

Snowdrops hang like tears.

Shy, sweet, saintly Beth has died.

One down, three to go.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wuthering Heights

 

Wild. Strange. A bit damp.

Heathcliff waits for Cathy's ghost.

Women. Always late.

 

 

 

 

 

Lady Chatterley's Lover

 

On the grounds, fresh game.

On the new gamekeeper, fresh

Lady Chatterley.          

 

 

 

 

Jane Eyre

 

O woe! His mad wife -

in the attic! Had they but

lived together first.

 

 

Kama Sutra

 

Advice for those in

a diffcult position.

First, be flexible.

 

 

 

Walden Or Life in the Woods

 

Morning: Pond-gazing.

Afternoon: Berry-picking.

What a hectic day.

 

 



 

 

 

Have you got any classic haiku's of your own?

 

 



Here's my response to the Classic Club December Meme...

 

A Christmas Carol

 

What a sad Christmas!

A Scrooge shaken up by ghosts.

Past. Future. Present.