climbing
all my mountains
tireless wind
empty
as I walk to the sea
I fill with water
on the path
only the autumn moon
and my sandals
no hope
of finding my mother
a lie I like to tell
the house
that knew my childhood
I have burned it
on the road
talking to myself
a poplar tree listens
my bed
at the edge of moonlight
no dreams come
These were written on 01 February in response to haiku written by poet Santoka Taneda, which I read in his collection 'For All My Walking' (translations by Burton Watson). They have been published online at http://haikutopics.blogspot.com/2006/09/santoka-and-sake.html . Santoka's sake poems may be well-known, but his poems on loneliness reflect a sincerity and openness of feeling that is not easy to find. He wrote of his life and lived it like a poem.
4 comments:
Inspired by Santoka or not, this is only a secondary fact.
The poems are splendid, full of suggestions, images and meanings, a true measure of your talent and sensitivity!
If I am allowed to make a little suggestion - I would use a "cut marker" in order to delimit the fragment and the phrase of the poem.
Thank you very much, dear Ella.
Warm wishes,
Dana-Maria
Oh Ella, I do like these, all of them; they are both quiet, and striking, all at once.... a very powerful sequence... thanks for sharing them....
Dina.
These are very good, ella. They have the santoka spirit, but they are Ella too.
Let me recommend *Santoka: Grass and Tree Cairn*, in which Hiroaki Sato translates santoka'a haiku as one-liners. His translations strike me as sharper than Watson's. Having no Japanese, I can't vouch for their accuracy.
I've never been able to get ahold of John Stevenson's book of Santoka
translations.
Best, Bill K
The translations are fairly clean and capture the feeling...
Cheers,
Patrick Sweeney
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