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‘Wake,
butterfly —’
 MATSUO BASHO
Born 1644, near Ueno, Japan
Died 1694, Osaka, Japan

This selection taken from On Love and Barley: Haiku ofBasho,

translated with an introduction by Lucien Stryk and
published in 1985.

MATSUO BASHO IN PENGUIN CLASSICS

On Love and Barley
The Narrow Road to the Deep North and Other Travel Sketches
MATSUO BASHO
Lips too chilled

Translated by
Lucien Stryk

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'Ibis selection published in Penguin Classics 2015

002

Copyright © Lucicn Stryk, 1985

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 In my new robe
this morning -
someone else.

Fields, mountains
of Hubaku, in
nine days - spring.

1
Matsuo Basho

Year by year,
the monkey’s mask
reveals the monkey.

New Year - the Basho-Tosei

hermitage
a-buzz with haiku.

2
 Lips too chilled

New Year -
feeling broody
from late autumn.

Spring come - New Year’s

gourd stuffed, five quarts
of last year’s rice.

3
Matsuo Basho

Plunging hoofs stir

Futami sand - divine white
horse greets New Year.

Spring night,
cherry-
blossom dawn.

4
 Lips too chilled

Wearing straw cloaks,

with spring
saints greet each other.

Spring’s exodus -
birds shriek,
fish eyes blink tears.

5
Matsuo Basho

Ploughing the field

for cherry-hemp -
storm echoes.

Spring rain -
under trees
a crystal stream.

6
 Lips too chilled

Monks’ feet clomping

through icy dark,
drawing sweet water.

Spring moon -
flower face
in mist.

7
Matsuo Basho

Spring rain -
they rouse me,
old sluggard.

Ebb tide -
willows
dip to mud.

8
 Lips too chilled

Sparrows in eaves,
mice in ceiling -
celestial music.

Dark night -
plover crying
for its nest.

9
Matsuo Basho

Over skylark’s song

Noh cry
of pheasant.

How terrible
the pheasant’s call -
snake-eater.

10
 Lips too chilled

Hozo mountain-pass
soars
higher than the skylark.

Bush-warbler dots
the rice-ball
drying on the porch.

11
Matsuo Basho

Bucking the oven

gap - cat
yowls in heat.

Now cat’s done

mewing, bedroom’s
touched by moonlight.

12
 Lips too chilled

Do not forget the plum,

blooming
in the thicket.

Spring air -
woven moon
and plum scent.

13
Matsuo Basho

Mountain path -
sun rising
through plum scent.

Another haiku?
Yet more cherry blossoms -
not my face.

H
 Lips too chilled

Sleeping willow -
soul of
the nightingale.

Behind the virgins’

quarters,
one blossoming plum.

15

I
Matsuo Basho

First cherry
budding
by peach blossoms.

Red plum blossoms:

where behind the
bead-screen’s love?

16
 Lips too chilled

Pretending to drink
sake from my fan,
sprinkled with cherry petals.

If I’d the knack

I’d sing like
cherry flakes falling.

17
 Matsuo Basho

Striding ten, twelve

miles in search of
cherry wreaths - how glorious.

Under the cherry -

blossom soup,
blossom salad.

■
18

-
 Lips too chilled

Reeling with sake

and cherry blossoms,
a sworded woman in haori.

Boozy on blossoms -
dark rice,
white sake.

19
Matsuo Basho

Come out, bat -

birds, earth itself
hauled off by flowers.

Waterfall garlands -
tell
that to revellers.

20
 Lips too chilled

Spraying in wind,
through blossoms,
waves of Lake Grebe.

Be careful where
you aim,
peaches of Fushimi.

21
Matsuo Basho

Sparrows
in rape-field,
blossom-viewing.

Cold white azalea -

lone nun
under thatched roof.

22
 Lips too chilled

Draining the sake

cask - behold,
a gallon flower-vase.

On my knees, hugging
roots, I grieve
for Priest Tando.

23
Matsuo Basho

Taros sprouting
at the gate,
young creepers.

Search carefully -
in the hedge,
a shepherd’s purse.

24
 Lips too chilled

Aged - eating
laver, my teeth
grind sand.

Cherry blossoms -
lights
of years past.

25
Matsuo Basho

Squalls shake the Basho

tree - all
night my basin echoes rain.

On the dead limb

squats a crow -
autumn night.

26
 Lips too chilled

Kiyotaki river -
pine needles wildfire
on the crest.

Parting,
straw-clutching
for support.

27
Matsuo Basho

Yellow rose petals

thunder -
a waterfall.

Whiter than stones

of Stone Mountain -
autumn wind.

28
 Lips too chilled

Sparrow, spare
the horsefly
dallying in flowers.

Drizzly June -
long hair, face
sickly white.

29
 Matsuo Basho

Nara’s Buddhas,
one by one -
essence of asters.

Darkening waves -
cry of wild ducks,
faintly white.

30

.f
 Lips too chilled

Faceless - bones
scattered in the field,
wind cuts my flesh.

Where cuckoo
vanishes -
an island.

3i
Matsuo Basho

Winter downpour -
even the monkey
needs a raincoat.

June clouds,
at ease on
Arashiyama peak.

32
 Lips too chilled

Butterfly -
wings curve into
white poppy.

Summer wraps -
is there no end
to lice?

33
Matsuo Basho

First winter rain -

I plod on,
Traveller, my name.

How quiet -
locust-shrill
pierces rock.

34
 Lips too chilled

Wild mallow fringing

the wood,
plucked by my horse.

Futami friends, farewell -

clam torn from shell,
I follow autumn.

35
Matsuo Basho

Traveller sleeps -
a sick wild duck reels
through cold night.

When I bend low

enough, purseweed
beneath my fence.

36
 Lips too chilled

Poet grieving over shivering

monkeys, what of this child
cast out in autumn wind?

Poor boy - leaves

moon-viewing
for rice-grinding.

37
 Matsuo Basho

Wake, butterfly -
it’s late, we’ve miles
to go together.

Violets -
how precious on
a mountain path.

38

\
i
 Lips too chilled

Gulping June
rains, swollen
Mogami river.

Early autumn -
rice field, ocean,
one green.

39
Matsuo Basho

Bright moon: I
stroll around the pond -
hey, dawn has come.

Storming over
Lake Nio, whirlwinds
of cherry blossoms.

40
 Lips too chilled

From moon-wreathed
bamboo grove,
cuckoo song.

Visiting tombs,
white-hairs bow
over canes.

4i
 Matsuo Basho
.

Skylark on moor -
sweet song
of non-attachment.

Clouds -
a chance to dodge
moon-viewing.

:. 42

I
i
 Lips too chilled

Birth of art -
song of rice planters,
chorus from nowhere.

Cresting Lake Omi’s

seven misted views,
Miidera’s bells.

43
 Matsuo Basho

Over Benkei’s temple,

flashing Yoshitune’s
sword - May carp.

Cormorant fishing:
how stirring,
how saddening.

44
i

i
 Lips too chilled

Skylark sings all

day, and day
not long enough.

Year’s end -
still in straw hat
and sandals.

45
II
5
Matsuo Basho

l ,
«
■

Moonlit plum tree -

I
. wait,
spring will come.
?

:
i

Snowy morning -
one crow
after another.

I
5

j-

I
::

46
 Lips too chilled

Come, see real

flowers
of this painful world.

Morning-glory -
it, too,
turns from me.

47
 Matsuo Basho

Travel-weary,
I seek lodging -
ah, wisteria.

Come, let’s go
snow-viewing
till we’re buried.

h
:
t

?:
48
?
 Lips too chilled

Chrysanthemum
silence - monk
sips his morning tea.

Crow’s
abandoned nest,
a plum tree.

49
.
■

: Matsuo Basho
:
.
!
1

,
Melon
?.
in morning dew,
mud-fresh.
;

Wintry day,
on my horse
a frozen shadow.

:!
-
50
t
 Lips too chilled

Summer moon -
clapping hands,
I herald dawn.

Drenched bush-clover,
passers-by -
both beautiful.

5i
 Matsuo Basho

Harsh sound -
hail spattering
my traveller’s hat.

Lips too chilled

for prattle -
autumn wind.

52
 Lips too chilled

Not one traveller

braves this road -
autumn night.

Withered grass,
under piling
heat-waves.

53
Matsuo Basho

Phew -
dace-guts scent
waterweed.

June rain,
hollyhocks turning
where sun should be.

54
 Lips too chilled

Journey’s end -
still alive, this
autumn evening.

How cold -
leek tips
washed white.

55
Matsuo Basho

Firefly-viewing -
drunken steersman,
drunken boat.

Dewy shoulders
of my paper robe -
heat-waves.
 i. boccaccio ■ Mrs Rosie and the Priest
i. Gerard manley hopkins • As kingfishers catchfire
3. The Saga of Gunnlaug Serpent-tongue
4. tiiomas de quincey • On Murder Considered as One ofthe Fine Arts
5. friedrich nietzsche • Aphorisms on Love and Hate
o. john ruskin • Traffic
7. pu songling • Wailing Ghosts
8. Jonathan swift •A Modest Proposal
9. Three Tang Dynasty Poets
10. walt whitman • On the Beach at Night Alone
u. kenko • A Cup ofSake Beneath the Cherry Trees
12. baltasar gracian ■ How to Use Your Enemies
13. john keats • The Eve ofSt Agnes
14. thomas hardy • Woman much missed
15. guy de Maupassant ■ Femme Fatale
16. marco polo • Travels in the Land ofSerpents and Pearls
17. Suetonius • Caligula
18. apollonius of Rhodes • Jason and Medea
19. ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON • Ololla
20. karl marx and friedrich engels • The Communist Manifesto
21. petronius • Trimalchio’sFeast
22. JOHANN PETER hebel • How a Ghastly Story Was Brought to Light by a
Common or Garden Butcher's Dog
23. hans Christian andersen • The Tinder Box
24. rudyard kipling • The Gate ofthe Hundred Sorrows
25. dante • Circles ofHell
26. henry mayhew • Of Street Piemen
27. hafez • The nightingales are drunk
28. Geoffrey chaucer ■ The Wife ofBath
29. michel de montaigne • How We Weep and Laugh at the SameThing
30. thomas nashe • The Terrors ofthe Might
si. edgar allan poe • The Tell-Tale Heart
32. mary kingsley ■ A Hippo Banquet
33. jane austen • TheBeautifullCassandra
34. anton chekhov ■ Gooseberries
35. Samuel taylor Coleridge • Well, they are gone, and here must I remain
36. johann Wolfgang von goethe • Sketchy, Doubtful, Incomplete
Jottings
37. Charles dickens ■ The Great Winglebury Duel
38. Herman melville • The Maidive Shark
39. Elizabeth gaskell • The Old Nurse’s Story
40. nikolay leskov ■ The Steel Flea
41. honor£ de balzac • The Atheist’s Mass
42. charlotte perkins gilman • The Tellow Wall-Paper
43. c.p. cavafy • Remember, Body. ..
44. fyodor Dostoevsky • The Meek One
45. Gustave flaubert ■ A Simple Heart
46. NIKOLAI GOGOL • TheNoSC
47. Samuel pepys • The Great Fire of London
48. edith wharton • The Reckoning
49. henry james • The Figure in the Carpet
50. Wilfred owen ■ Anthem For Doomed Youth
si. Wolfgang amadeus mozart • My Dearest Father
52. plato • Socrates’ Defence
53. Christina rossetti • Goblin Market
54. Sindbad the Sailor
55. sophocles •Antigone
56. ryunosuke akutagawa • The Life ofa Stupid Man
57. leo tolstoy • How Much Land Does A Man Need?
58. giorgio vasari • Leonardo da Vinci
59. oscar wilde • Lord Arthur Saoile’s Crime
60. shen fu ■ The Old Man ofthe Moon
61. aesop ■ The Dolphins, the Whales and the Gudgeon
62. matsuo basho ■ Lips too Chilled
63. emily bronte • The Night is Darkening Round Me
64. JOSEPH CONRAD • To-mOTTOXi)
65. Richard hakluyt • The Voyage ofSir Francis Drake Around the
Whole Globe
66. kate chopin • A Pair ofSilk Stockings
67. Charles darwin • It was snowing butterflies
68. brothers grimm • The Robber Bridegroom
69. catullus • I Hate and I Love
70. homer • Circe and the Cyclops
71. D. H. LAWRENCE ■ IlDuTO
72. KATHERINE MANSFIELD • Miss Brill
73. ovid • The Fall ofIcarus
74. sappho • Come Close
75. ivan turgenev • Kasyanfrom the Beautiful Lands
76. virgil • 0 Cruel Alexis
77. H. G. wells ■ A Slip under the Microscope
78. Herodotus • The Madness of Cambyses
79. Speaking ofSiva
80. The Dhammapada
>
•V-

LITTLE BLACK

Lips too chilled

Japans celebrated Buddhist poet balances the
smallness of humanity with nature's epic drama
in these magical seventeenth-century haikus.

ISBN 978-0-14-139845-?
60200

9 780141 398457