Friday, December 28, 2007

Haiku Death Poem from 1858

By the poet Saiba
written on the fifteenth day of the eighth month, 1858

I shift my pillow
closer to the
full moon.

Meigetsu no
ho e korobasu
makura kana


— from Japanese Death Poems written by zen monks and haiku poets on the verge of death
compiled with an introduction by Yoel Hoffmann (Tuttle, 1986)


This is reprinted as a review of the book, which does not need any further review than an example of the one of the book's many poems.

2 comments:

tairaku said...

That's one of my favorite books.

Chris Moran said...

Yes, I've admired it for a number of years. My wife bought it for me for Christmas. I kept opening it to the poem I posted. I'd love to hear it chanted in Japanese.