Ten Haiku KONISHI RAIZAN
MATSUO BASHŌ
Girls planting paddy: only their song free of mud.
The beginning of all art— in the deep north, a rice-planting song.
A whole field of rice seedlings planted—I part from the willow.
In Kyoto, hearing the cuckoo, I long for Kyoto.
A cicada shell— it sang itself utterly away.
YOSA BUSON
Piercing chill— stepping on my dead wife’s comb in the bedroom
My arm for my pillow, I really like myself under the hazy moon.
1
Dawn— fish the cormorants haven’t caught swimming in the shallows.
Coolness— the sound of the bell as it leaves the bell.
Washing the hoe— ripples on the water; far off, wild ducks.
2