Carpe Diem's Leafless Tree #3 Morikawa Kyoroku, one of Basho's disciples

Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

What a joy to give you another episode of our special feature "Leafless Tree" in which I introduce not renown haiku poets of all times. This time I have chosen for one of Basho's ten most important disciples, Morikawa Kyoroku (1656-1715). And I even remember that I have introduced him somewhere in our rich CDHK history. Let me tell you a little bit more about Kyoroku:

Kyoroku’s haiku debut was with Kitamura Kingin. He was part of the Danrin Haikai school.
In 1689 he became a more serious haikai master and studied with Esa Shoohaku (1650-1722) of the Basho disciples in Omi.

During a trip to Edo in 1691 he studied with Kikaku and Ransetsu. In 1692 he met Basho in Fukagawa. Since he was a man of many talents and "six (roku) arts" (spear, sword, horse riding, calligraphy, painting and haikai), Basho offered him the haikai name of Kyoroku.
Kyoroku could only study with Basho for about 10 months, before he had to go back to his domaine in Hikone.
Basho wrote for him Saimon no Ji (The Rustic Gate), with all the secrets of haikai writing.

Morikawa Kyoroku (1656-1715)

Kyoroku was one of the 10 most important haiku disciples of Basho, but isn't as renown as his master. He was quite close to Basho in his later years. Kyoroku even taught Basho how to paint even better, since Kyoroku was an experienced painter himself of the Kano school of painting.
There are also some co-operations with poems by Basho on paintings by Kyoroku.

When he got news of the death of his beloved master, he cut a cherry tree, carved a statue of Basho and send it to Kawai Chigetsu.

What a wonderful idea this is. How would I have enjoyed the company of Basho and learn the skills you need to write / create haiku ... must have been really awesome I think.

Morning Glories

Here are a few haiku written by Kyoroku:

ah! morning glories
are at their best while I chant
my morning prayers

it is dawn
the castle surrounded
by quacking wild ducks

© Morikawa Kyoroku (Tr. Chèvrefeuille)

Deep in the water, 
softly moving his fins, 
a carp, dreaming

© Morikawa Kyoroku (Tr. unknown)

The goal of "Carpe Diem's Leafless Tree" - feature is to create your own haiku or tanka inspired on the haiku given by me. Try to touch the same tone and sense as in the haiku.

Here is mine:

veiled moon
in her faint light we sail the lake
the call of plovers

© Chèvrefeuille

Well I hope you did like this "Leafless Tree" episode and that it will inspire you to create your own haiku, tanka or other kind of Japanese poetry inspired on the beautiful haiku by Kyoroku.

This episode of "Carpe Diem's Leafless Tree" is NOW OPEN for your submissions and will remain open until November 11th at noon (CET). Have fun!

Carpe Diem's Leafless Tree #2 through our torn paper doors (Sokan)

Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

Welcome at a new episode of our feature "Leafless Tree" in which I introduce not so well-known haiku poets. This episode I have a nice haiku poet for you who lived in the 16th century, Yamazaki Sokan. I had never heard of him, but recently I ran into a few haiku by him in a Dutch Haiku Anthology compiled by J. van Tooren's relatives.

Let me tell you a little bit more about Sokan:

Yamazaki Sōkan (1465–1553) was a renga and haikai poet from Ōmi Province, Japan. His real name was Shina Norishige, and he was also called Yasaburō; "Yamazaki Sōkan" was a pen-name (haigo).

Originally serving as a court calligrapher for the ninth Ashikaga shogun, Ashikaga Yoshihisa, the poet became a Buddhist monk and entered seclusion following the shogun's death in 1489. Traveling through Settsu and Yamashiro provinces, he finally settled in a place called Yamazaki. Establishing his hermitage, which he named Taigetsu-an, he adopted the name Yamazaki Sōkan. The location of this hermitage is debated, since the town of Shimamoto, Osaka, claims to contain its remains, as does the Myōkian, a temple in Ōyamazaki, Kyoto.

Yamazaki Sokan (1465-1553)

Sōkan left Yamazaki in 1523 and settled five years later in the town of Kan'onji in Sanuki province. On the grounds of Kōshōji, he made a hermitage for himself called Ichiya-an, where he spent the rest of his life composing poems.

Though his poems were not widely distributed at first, they were soon compiled into a text called Daitsukubashū. He also compiled and edited the Inu-tsukuba-shū, another important anthology of renga and haikai. His unrefined style came to be influential and inspired the development of the danrin style of poetry, which emerged in the early 17th century.

Sōkan died in 1553, after gaining a degree of fame and wealth for his poems and calligraphy. (Source: wikipedia)

His haiku in my opinion are very pure, but look more like senryu, because of the unrefined style. Here are a few haiku / senryu written by him:

Sahohime no haru tatsu nagara shito o shite

Princess Saho
stands when pissing
at the beginning of spring

waga oya no shinuru toki ni mo he o kokite

even when 

my father lay down dying 

I kept farting 

kaze samushi yabure-shooji no kannazuki

cold wind

through our torn paper doors

in the month without gods *

© Yamazaki Sokan (Tr. Gabi Greve)

* The 10th lunar month, nowadays November, was known as the "month without gods"

These haiku are beauties, the first two more hilarious, but that third on is in my opinion a masterpiece worth reading often and aloud.

I hope you did like the read, but now your task ... I love to challenge you to create a new haiku inspired on the given haiku trying to touch the same tone and sense. And than ... I love to challenge you to create a Troiku with the haiku you have created. Have fun ...!

This episode is NOW OPEN for your submissions and will remain open until November 4th at noon (CET).

Carpe Diem's Leafless Tree #1 introduction "beautiful waves"

credits

Dear Haijin, visitors and travelers,

You all are familiar with that one unknown haiku poet I introduced to you here at CDHK, Yozakura. Yozakura was a contemporary of Basho and one of his disciples.. Yozakura taught me that there is always a possibility to become a haiku poet. Yozakura's life wasn't easy, but he was driven by a dream ... to become an apprentice of Basho. And as we all know he became a disciple of the master.

Yozakura was an unknown haiku poet, but there are more unknown haiku poets and I love to introduce these unknown haiku poets to you. Therefore I have created this new feature "Carpe Diem Leafless Tree". In this new feature I will introduce them to you and I challenge you to create haiku inspired on their "unknown" haiku.

This new feature I hope to publish every Sunday as a kind of treat for you my dear CDHK family members ... You All are the purpose of my life to inspire you with the beauty of Japanese poetry especially haiku and tanka ... For this first episode I have chosen for a contemporary of Shiki. I really didn't know this haiku poet, a disciple of Shiki, and I couldn't find some background about him. After a long evening of surfing the Internet I finally found a little bit of background.

Beautiful Waves (image found on Pinterest)

For this first episode of "Leafless Tree" I have chosen Heiro Yaezakura (1879-1945), the title is taken from one of his haiku:

The boats 
Escaping the heat at night 
Move the beautiful waves 

© Yaezakura

Yaezakura (sounds familiar ?) was a disciple of Shiki, but he also was a haiku poet who wrote a lot of haiku for Shiki’s column in the Japanese newspaper “Nihon”, but Shiki didn’t appreciate his haiku. Two years before Shiki died he started to write several journals. One of those journals was titled Bokuju Itteki “A Drop Of Ink” and in that journal he writes the following about Yaezakura:

[...] “Mr Yaezakura may be said to write the most. He sends in thousands of poems every season, and usually writes from twenty to fifty on each subject. But he puts them together at random, oblivious of whether they are banal mediocrities or no more than plagiarisms, as though he lusted for quantity at any cost. It makes me feel rather sick.” [...] (Source: Monumenta Nipponica, Vol. 30, No. 3 (Autumn, 1975)

Here are two other nice haiku by Yaezakura:

The coldness 
Of a broad road
In the mountain country 

In the deep mountains 
Men awaiting the salmon, 
Burn the grasses 

© Yaezakura

Yaezakura an unknown haiku poet who was a disciple of Shiki and I never had heard of him, but now he is out in the open. I like these three haiku he wrote, are those masterpieces? I don't know, but I like them.

seaguls cry against the wind
it seems that they admire the beautiful waves
the horizon turns red

© Chèvrefeuille

I hope you do like this new feature. This episode is NOW OPEN for your submissions and will remain open until October 26th at noon (CEST).