Feb '04 [Home] Poetry: Haiku Masters Eighteen Haiku by Kikaku, translated by Michael K. Bourdaghs |
. | . | . | . | Takarai Kikaku (1661-1707, also known as Enomoto Kikaku) was one of Basho's leading disciples. He edited two of the major anthologies through which the Basho School earned its reputation, including Minashiguri (Shriveled Chestnuts, 1683), and wrote the preface for a third—Saruminosho (Monkey's Straw Raincoat, 1691). But his relations with his master were often tense—he is often the butt of anecdotal lore handed down among the disciples—and there seems to have been a final falling out. He is nowhere mentioned, for example, in Basho's last great work, Oku no hosomichi (The Narrow Road to the Back Country). Kikaku's poetry is known for its wit and for its difficulty. Whereas Basho, especially in his later years, focused on the countryside and espoused an aesthetic of simplicity, Kikaku preferred the city and the opportunities it provided for extravagant play. He also preferred a more demanding form of poetry, one laced with wordplay, allusions, and juxtapositions of images that defy easy explanation. At the time of his death, he was perhaps the leading poet in Edo (today's Tokyo), which then had a population of around one million, making it perhaps the largest city in the world at the time.—MB Nightingale's body In Kyomachi a cat prowling for love heads for Ageyamachi [Kyomachi and Ageyamachi were districts inside the Yoshiwara pleasure quarters of Edo.] A waterfall of sake and cool barley noodles rain down from heaven! Tonic for summer-heat a dog licks it up and climbs the cloud peaks Pillars of mosquitoes a floating bridge of dreams spans across As a fine horse gallops 20,000 poems are houseflies scattered in the wind [Written to commemorate Ihara Saikaku's composition of 23,500 poems on a single day in 1684, with Kikaku in attendance.] If a rich man is what you mean to be. Then forget the autumn evening too The full autumn moon on this straw mat pine tree shadow The hoarse voice of a monkey, but its teeth are shiny white mountain peak and moon Kagura dance at night the performer's breath white inside his mask [Kagura is a kind of ritual dance performed at Shinto temples.] This snow is mine thinking that way it seems lighter on your sedge hat This wooden gate shuts me out for the night winter moon Above the sea a rainbow, erased by a flock of swallows A summer storm suddenly the one who peers outside the woman A single bell you sell at least one each day spring in Edo Michael K. Bourdaghs teaches modern Japanese literature at UCLA. His fiction has appeared in Hawaii Pacific Review, Colere, Elysian Fields Quarterly, and elsewhere. He is the author of The Dawn That Never Comes: Shimazaki Toson and Japanese Nationalism. |