At Urami Falls . . .

Matsuo Bashô #503/511/515/519/520/510

At Urami Falls
monks go into seclusion
-- all summer long.


Literally:

At the falls a long while
they go into seclusion
the start of summer.


[白狐]

[MB503, summer, 1689.]
shibaraku wa / taki ni komoru / ge no hajime.

ura-mi = "back-view" > "to be seen from the back".
for-a-while/for-a-long-time // at-waterfall seclude-oneself //
of-summer (ge=xià) beginning.

In Jane's book it says "1688 - summer", but this is also from
Bashô's journal Narrow Path to the Deep North (1689) [> ONH #4].
_ _ _

Written for the man that lead the horse
Bashô was sitting on on the way to Killing Rock:

To the field beside me
do pull to turn the horse --
a little cuckoo.


[白狐]

[MB511, summer, 1689.]
no wo yoko ni / uma hiki-muke yo / hototogisu.

hiki-muke = by-pulling turn-to (imp.)
_ _ _

A willow recommended in a letter to Bashô
by a local lord called Ashino Suketoshi:

One paddy patch
planted, I stand up to leave
Ashino's willow . . .


[白狐]

Jane Reichhold claims this haiku is
"faulted, because it is written in the past tense."
Nonsense: tachi-saru (tatsu+saru) is in the present tense,
so is uete !!

[MB515, summer, 1689.]
ta ichi maï / uete tachi-saru / yanagi ka na.

(rice-)paddy one patch // (after-)planting
after-standing-up I-leave // willow ~~
Ashino is also the name of the village.
_ _ _

Greeting verse and beginning verse for a renga party
hosted by Sagara Tôkyû in Sukagawa:

The beginning of
culture and rice planting songs
of the deep north.


[白狐]

[MB519, summer, 1689.]
fuuryuu no / hajime ya oku no / ta ue uta.

culture's // beginning and of-the-interior // (rice-)paddy plant(-ing) songs.
_ _ _

The Chinese character for chestnut tree consists of two radicals:
"west" and "tree" >> the Pure Land of the West:

worldly men blind to
blossoms and chestnut trees
under the eaves.


[白狐]

[MB520, summer, 1689, at priest Kashin's. Renga starting verse:]
yo no hito no / mitsuke-nu hana ya / noki no kuri.

of-world/worldly people's/person's(-s') // not-finding blossom(s) and //
of/under-eaves chestnut-tree(s).

chestnut trees are associated with priests/monks and hermits.
_ _ _

Bashô: "Seeing Butchô's place is so much more impressive
than hearing about it, and I feel my heart is purified."

Bashô pinned this haiku on the post of the hut:

No woodpecker would
ever damage your hut --
a summer grove.


[白狐]

[MB510, summer, 1689.]
ki-tsutsuki mo / io wa yabura-zu / natsu kodachi.

Apparantly "yaburu" (damage) = also: "yabururu" (be damaged) >>
"io wa" is subject and "ki-tsutsuki (ni) mo" in an ablative.

(by) tree/wood-pecker (same as in English !!) ever //
hut (nom.) damaged wouldn't-be // summer trees/grove.
_ _ _

Source: "Bashô - The Complete Haiku", translated by Jane Reichhold.