Stay a While and Listen ~ Haiku of Japan

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Old Issa again with his love of insects and small creatures, which he never tired of.

又泊れ行灯にとまれ青い虫
mata tomare ando ni tomare aoi mushi

stop once more,
green insect, linger here
on my lantern’s glow
—Issa

(trans. David LaSpina[1])


Lake Biwa by Koho



As always, Issa the insect and animal lover, comes through. Here he is inviting his little friends to stay and warm themselves by the fire. I think we all have the experience of watching bugs attracted to light at night. Well, instead of shooing them off as most of us would do, Issa hopes they can stay awhile. This kind of interest in the well-fare of animals and insects may be one of the reasons for his enduring popularity. You can imagine a Bob Ross of 200 years ago and his happy little friends.

❦

Hi there! David LaSpina is an American photographer and translator lost in Japan, trying to capture the beauty of this country one photo at a time and searching for the perfect haiku. He blogs here and at laspina.org. Write him on Twitter or Mastodon.

  1. That is, me! If you like this translation, feel free to use it. Just credit me. Also link here if you can. ↩

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11 comments
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Very cool. Sorry to keep bringing it up, but there was a scene in Shogun where something happened and one of the leaders looked to a guy next to him and said "give me a poem about that". The guy thought a bit and then rattled off a Haiku. It made me think of you.

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haha don't be sorry—it's nice to see you are enjoying it so much. Yeah, in old Japan that was a think. Or writing a poem before killing yourself. Did I say old Japan? Even today some people do it!

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I was actually just thinking the other day about some of the suicide forests I have heard about and things like that. It made me wonder if the old seppuku thing is a big influence for that. As a westerner it seems horrific (I mean it is right), but since ritual suicide was so common there in the past, it might not be as shocking outside of the US. The forests thing I mean.

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I wouldn't say seppuku was all that common, actually. Our modern image is warped by samurai movies these days. The only people who would have done seppuku were the samurai, but they only accounted for about 10% of the population. Regular people viewed the samurai with hatred and suspicion and would have considered seppuku as pretty crazy.

But anyway, yeah, these days our attitudes have been influenced by media and some types of suicide or reasons for it have taken on a more noble image. Some people who do it in Japan may have that in mind. But it's usually more of an escape of depressed people, same as in the West.

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My mistake then :) Great info and good insight!

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I like the rhythmic quality of the repetition in this one. I didn't know the word "ando" and I was thinking how it would add another layer to the comedy of using the English "and" with Japanese speakers who usually pronounce it "ando" ... Then I noticed the middle line 字足らず ... perhaps the word is "andou" I thought, and put it into Google translate. Turns out there is a missing "n" and the word does indeed have three syllables: "an-do-n."
!BBH
!ALIVE

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