RELUCTANT RECLUSE, new versions in English and Irish by Gabriel Rosenstock of medieval tanka master Saigyō: a work in progress.

 

 RELUCTANT RECLUSE, new versions in English

and Irish by Gabriel Rosenstock of medieval tanka master Saigyō: a work in progress.

Invocation

“It is only when many meanings are compressed into a single word, when the depths of feelings are exhausted yet not expressed, when an unseen world hovers in the atmosphere of the poem, when the mean and common are used to express the elegant, when a poetic conception of rare beauty is developed to the fullest extent in a style of surface simplicity – only then, when the conception is exalted to the highest degree and ‘the words are too few’ will the poem, by expressing one’s feelings in this way, have the power of moving Heaven and Earth within the brief confines of thirty-one syllables and be capable of softening the hearts of gods and demons . . .”

Priest Shun’e (12th century), quoted in Japanese Culture,Paul Varley, University of Hawaii Press, 2000.

“Despite not being (technically) Zen, a very good case could be made for calling Saigyō the most influential Zen poet in Japanese history. He changed the way Buddhist poets practiced; he became the model for the Zen mountain recluse-poet in his ten-foot square hut. He was Bashō’s master, Ryokan’s master, and grandfather to the Zen poetry traditions of Japan. He is a mountain . . . “

Sam Hamill, Simply Haiku, Vol. 3, No. 2

In these new transcreations in English and Irish of tanka grandmaster and traveling acetic Saigyō (1118-1190), the original configuration of 5-7-5-7-7 syllables associated with waka or tanka is retained. As a spiritual exercise, one’s favourite tanka from this collection may be read aloud, chanted or quietly internalised, mantra-like, on a regular basis.

In A History of Japanese Literature (D. Appleton and Co., New York, 1903) W. G. Aston says of the tanka; “It is wonderful what felicity of phrase, melody of versification, and true sentiment can be compressed within these narrow limits.” Wonderful indeed, words that echo the invocation by Priest Shun’e with which this book commences!

Haiku master Bashō advised his followers and disciples not to imitate him, or follow the path that he had chosen, but to seek out the ancient pathless path of those luminaries of old, such as Saigyō, a twelfth-century monk and tanka master of subtle power and genius, a prolific poet who composed two thousand or so tanka, a Buddhist of samurai background whose beliefs brought him great solace in a troubled era but also led to some conflicts with himself, as man and poet. All this at a time when Buddhism itself was suffering a decline in Japan.

As William R. La Fleur points out, Saigyō was near the end of his life when he wrote this flashback poem:

shino tamete

suzume yumi haru

o no warawa

hitai eboshi no

hoshige naru kana

 

little bamboo bow

is grasped, look now how the youth

at a sparrow aims:

he already longs to wear

armour of a samurai

 

bogha de bhambú

ag an laoch, an garsún óg

díríonn ar ghealbhan:

cheana féin santaíonn sé

culaith chatha an tsamúraí

How vividly and yet how mysteriously he describes his farewell to the secular world and all its pleasures:

sora ninaru

kokoro wa haru no

kasumi nite

yo ni araji tomo

omoitatsu kana

 

he whose mind’s become

one with emptiness of sky

steps into spring mist

he keeps thinking to himself

from this world I’ve stepped away

duine is a mheon

ar aon dul leis an bhfolús

ceo earraigh gach áit

arsa sé, cá bhfuil a shiúl

’bhfuil an domhan á leá im’ dhiaidh?

The word sora in the first line of the Japanese suggests both ‘sky’ and ‘voidness’ or ‘emptiness’. If emptying the mind is a technique towards increasing creativity, Saigyō is proof of that.

Some take to the life of a mendicant as others seem to be to the manor born! But it must have been particularly hard on Saigyō as he was known to have many friends – and lovers too, more than likely. He enjoyed and excelled in court sports. However, he didn’t sever all connections with the world, or abandon those mores which then as now, influenced his class – native and imported belief systems such as Shinto, Daoism and Confucianism.

In this next tanka, the introspective Saigyō gives us a taste of his indecision – but we feel we already know his mind, his inner determination and keen insight into his own destiny:

oshimu tote

oshimarenubeki

kono yo kawa

mi o sutete koso

mi o mo tasukeme

 

loath to leave behind

what is loathsome anyhow –

in this world one’s place

for the way to save the self

may be leaving it behind

 

leasc liom é ’fhágáil

gach a fhágáil i mo dhiaidh

agus m’áit sa saol

chun an féin a shábháil ámh

caith an féin i dtraipisí

This new life of a monk . . .  no more dalliances with perfumed ladies-in-waiting, or homoerotic affairs with fellow warriors (as has  sometimes been suggested; Bashō, too, was bisexual) . . . will he be able to shake himself – like one might shake a temple bell – into a new life, a life of serenity and nirvana?

Not at first, it seems:

yama fukami

kejikaki tori no

oto wa sede

mono osoroshiki

fukurō no koe

 

deep in the mountains

the songs of the birds is not

what we knew at home –

nothing but hair-raising hoots

from owls in the dead of night

 

croílár na sléibhte

cantain na n-éan níl mar a bhí

sa bhaile againn

scréach a chuirfeadh sceimhle ort

ón ulchabhán gach oíche

He wrote many tanka which commence with ‘yama fukami’ meaning ‘so remote the mountain’ or ‘deep in the mountains’. In many cultures, as we know, mountains have strong religious significance and frequently are the home of the gods or gods themselves. (In Ireland, pagan mountains such as Croagh Patrick became Christianised whilst others, such as the Paps of Dana, resisted conversion).

The pen-name Saigyō means ‘Westward Journey’: in Pure Land Buddhism (practised by among others the great haiku master Issa), recitation of the Buddha’s name was enough to guarantee rebirth in the Western Pure Land of Sukhāvatī.

Donald Keene strikes an interesting note when he opines:

”It is likely that the life of a hermit, secluded from the  world in a lonely hut, attracted the young Saigyō more  than any religious teaching, and induced him to ‘leave     the world.’ ”    Seeds of the Heart (Henry Holt and Company Inc.) 1993.

Steven D. Carter sums up the genius of Saigyō differently:

“One effect of Saigyō’s lifestyle was to create a monkish    persona in his poetry that sometimes obscures his great skill and sophistication as an artist. Indeed, his consistent      adoption of this guise of the “reluctant recluse” who has left    the world but still finds himself drawn by it can be seen as one of Saigyō’s major artistic accomplishments . . .”

Traditional Japanese Poetry: An Anthology   (Stanford University Press, 1991)

Courtiers were said to live above the clouds but no one can escape the day of reckoning:

kumo no ue no

tanoshimi tote mo

kahi zo naki

sate shimo yagate

sumishi hateneba

 

life above the clouds

ah such pleasure, yes indeed

but we all must know

that a life of joy and ease

cannot last for all of time

 

sea nach méanar dóibh

saol os cionn na néalta bán’

saol nach bhfuil ag cách

tagann deireadh le gach só

níl aon luibh in aghaidh an bháis

Let’s enjoy some of his love poems now. Were they based on actual love affairs or is he just following the conventions of Japanese poetry, much in the spirit of the dánta grá of Ireland or Amour Courtois, namely a chivalrous tradition with ‘aubades’ and other tropes of courtly love? In this first poem we have a dawn poem; a broken tryst is the theme of the second.

moon at break of day

memories come flooding back

when I lingered on

like these dark and heavy clouds

as they trail away at dawn

 

gealach bhreacadh an lae

tagann cuimhní chugam ar ais

nuair a mhoillíos tráth

mé ar nós na scamall dubh

iad á dtabhairt leis ag an lá

hito wa kode

kaze no keshiki mo

fukenuru ni

aware ni kari no

otozurete yuku

 

late she is my love –

the night is wasting away

the wind confirms it

mournful the cry of wild geese

as they come my way and pass

 

níor tháinig mo ghrá

is gearr uainn breacadh an lae

sin a deir an ghaoth

éamh na ngéanna fiáine

iad ag teacht ’s ag imeacht uaim

amagumo no

warinaki hima o

moru tsuki no

kage bakari dani

aimiteshi gana

 

rays of moonlight stream

through an unexpected gap

in the heavy clouds

could we come together now

briefly for a secret tryst

solas na gealaí

lonraíonn trí na néalta dú’

bearna obann ghlé

dá mbeinn féin ‘s mo mhíle grá

tamaillín le chéile anocht

EARRACH / SPRING

kyō mo mata

matsu no kaze fuku

oka e yukan

kinō suzumishi

tomo ni au ya to

 

and today once more

to the hill I’ll make my way

where the pine winds blow

maybe come across my friend

as before, enjoying the shade

 

is arís inniu

raghaidh mé go dtí an cnoc

leoithne tríd an ngiúis

buailfead seans lem’ chara ann

’bhí á fhuarú ann inné

 

nagamu tote

hana ni mo itaku

narenureba

chiru wakare koso

kanashikarikere

 

as at them i gaze

i’ve grown very close indeed

to these blossoms all

parting with them when they fall –

such a bitter day ‘twill be

 

nuair a fheicim iad

braithim an-chóngarach

do na blátha seo

titfidh siad go léir ar ball

och monuar nach trua an scéal

 

“Saigyō’s cherry blossom poems often express a sense of attachment to the blossoms and have been interpreted as self-remonstrative in the Buddhist sense  . . .” Traditional Japanese Literature: An Anthology, Beginnings to 1600 by Haruo Shinane (Columbia University Press, 2012)

He wrote at least 230 poems about cherry blossoms! His final years were spent on Mount Yoshino, headquarters of the Shingon sect, an area famed in song and story for its cherry trees.

To understand the depths of poignancy found in this next tanka, we must see how kanashi or sabi (loneliness) lies at the heart of it all.

“The human condition was essentially one of loneliness;  but, however painful the awareness of that might be,  the medieval Japanese were able to realize some   consolation in the beauty of sabi, which they found in   such things as a desolate field or a monochromatic, withered marsh . . .”   (Japanese Culture, H. Paul Varley, University of      Hawaii Press, 2000)

free of all desire

yet one must be moved to tears

on an autumn eve

seeing them rising from the marsh –

flocks of snipe with longish beaks

 

an té bheadh gan chroí

eisean fiú chorrófaí é

is bheadh uaigneas air

tráthnóna amach san fhómhar

naoscaigh! iad os cionn an réisc

This is what Bashō meant when he advised his disciples to see and feel what Saigyō saw and felt. That sudden flurry, snipe (sometimes translated as ‘woodcock’) taking wing over a marsh:  here we are, inside his most popular tanka, in the very heart of autumn and all its loneliness, as it were swallowed up by the landscape in an instant of pure consciousness. In such a happening, or awakening, is born the strange, elusive and elevating beauty of tanka and its offshoot, haiku. This magnificent tanka is marked by kanashi (sadness), awaré (sorrow felt at the inevitability of change) and wabi-sabi (loneliness):

“The Narrow Road to the Interior, which traces Bashō’s journey of 1689, can be interpreted as an offering or tribute to the spirit of Saigyō (1118-90) on the     five-hundredth anniversary of his death. As the ultimate host of Bashō’s journey, Saigyō becomes the object of various poems of gratitude, tribute, or remembrance, particularly at the utamakura, the poetic places in which the poet’s spirit resides. . . .”    Haruo Shirane, Traces of Dreams: Landscape, Cultural Memory, and the Poetry of Basho    (Stanford University Press, 1998).

The tanka above illustrates a technique known as ‘distant link’, a fragmentation or break between the first three lines (kami no ku) and the last two (shimo no ku). As Jin’ichi Konishi explains:

“What we have here is a kind of descriptive  symbolism, with the signification of the   symbols hinted at by a more discursive  passage before the images. The two parts of    the poem are truly ‘distant’ from each other,  but they have been integrated…” (Quoted in Shinkokinshō, Rodd (Brill 2015)

Let us pause for a moment and enjoy one of Bashō’s tributes to Saigyō:

 

imo arau onna

Saigyō nara ba

uta yoman

women washing potatoes –

were Saigyō here

he’d compose a poem

[Version: GR]

The word Bashō uses is not tanka or waka but uta, meaning ‘song’. Chanting the verses of Saigyō is the best way to enjoy them. The very act of intonation in a chanting style creates a transcendental vibration which helps to bring out all the compressed beauty of the verse.

The art of chanting poetry is called shigin in Japan. Purists and traditionalists may object, but this author believes that contemporary forms of shigin can and should be cultivated, fusion-style – without replacing traditional forms, of course – and we look forward to the day when shigin-inspired chanting of Saigyō’s poems may be heard in other languages, Irish included!

‘Tanka’ and ‘waka’ are practically interchangeable. The last syllable, ka, simply means ‘poem’. Waka means, a Japanese poem, Tanka means a short poem. So, wa denotes ‘Japanese’ and tan denotes ‘short’.

naka naka ni

kaze no hosu ni zo

midarekeru

ame ni nuretaru

aoyagi no ito

 

tangled more and more

in the all-embracing wind

that is drying them out

threads of greenish willow now

all a-glistening in the rain

 

i bhfostú níos mó

agus níos mó fós sa ghaoth

atá á dtriomú:

snátha glasa na sailí

fliuch ón bhfearthainn iad go léir

yoshinoyama

kozo no shiori no

michi kaete

mada minu kata no

hana o tazunen

 

let’s forget the trail

marked out on Mount Yoshino

one full year ago

time to look for blossoms now

on a path not walked before

 

thuas ar Yoshino

dheineas conair ann dom féin

bliain ó shin inniu

seo mé ’lorg bláth arís –

cosán nach bhfuil siúlta fós

Yoshinoyama

kozue no hana o

mishi hi yori

kokoro wa mi ni mo

sowazu nariniki

 

since the day i saw

blooming on Mount Yoshino

all those cherry trees

in one place my body is

in another is my heart

nuair ba léir dom shúil

ar Shliabh Yoshino faoi bhláth

míle crann silín’

bhí mo chorp in áit ar leith

in áit eile bhí mo chroí

mi o wakate

minu kozue naku

tsukusaba ya

yorozu no yama no

hana no sakari o

 

to divide oneself*

if only it were easy

not to miss a tree

view the blossoms in their prime

scattered over countless peaks

dá mbeinn féin in ann

an corp seo ’roinnt ’na mhíle

breathnú ar gach crann

iad i mbarr a n-áilleachta

iad faoi bhláth ar fud na n-ard

(*A beautiful allusion to the omnipresence of the Buddha).

 

hana ni somu

kokoro no ika de

nokoriken

sute hateteki to

omou waga mi ni

 

why is it my heart

has this crazy passion still

for these blossoms pink

have I not left them behind

and much else this many a year?

 

cén fáth ’bhfuil mo chroí

gafa fós le bláthanna

na silíní seo

d’fhágas iad ar fad im’ dhiaidh

blianta blianta fada ó shin

 

negawaku wa

hana no shita nite

haru shinan

sono kisaragi no

mochizuki no koro

 

lig dom bás a fháil

faoi na crainn is iad faoi bhláth

is an ghealach lán

mar a bhíonn sa dara mí

sin le rá Kisaragi

 

may I find my death

underneath the blooming trees

when the moon is full

as the moon will always be –

second month of lunar year

 

His wish was granted. The Buddha died on the fifteenth month of the lunar year (Kisaragi) and Saigyō on the sixteenth of that month in 1190. Burton Watson tells us that on the poet’s death, Saigyō’s prophecy was the talk of many who were familiar with the poem. His life became the subject of many plays and puppet shows.

‘When the moon is full’ is a metaphor for enlightenment as in this poem by Dogen, a philosopher-poet who flourished a century later:

 

The moon reflected
In a mind clear
As still water:
Even the waves, breaking,
Are reflecting its light.       (Trans. Steven Heine)

 

 

hotoke ni wa

sakura no hana o

tatematsure

waga nochi no yo o

hito toburawaba

 

blátha silíní

déan iad sin a ofráil

sin a bhfuil le rá

le lucht caointe i mo dhiaidh

ofráil blátha silíní

 

offer up some flowers

for all those who’ve gone before

sakura* so frail

this is all that I can say

to all mourners when I’m gone

 

(*cherry blossoms)

 

hana no iro ya

koe ni somuran

uguisu no

naku ne kotonaru

haru no akebono

 

the cherry blossoms

must be dyed in that same sound *–

call of the warbler

as wonderful as ever

springtime at the dawn of day

 

blátha silíní

daite ag an bhfuaim sin . . .

guth an cheolaire

chomh hálainn is a bhí riamh

insan earrach breacadh lae

 

*’Dyed in that same sound’ is a striking example of synaesthesia.

Russian film director Sergei Eisenstein believed that ‘the synaesthetic principle of montage is a characteristic of Japanese art and literature grounded in the nature of the Japanese language itself where simple pictograms are juxtaposed into complete ideographs to form a new meaning beyond the mere combination of elements’.

(from Tragic Beauty in Whitehead and Japanese Aesthetics, Steve Odin, Lexington Books, 2016)

wakite min

oiki wa hana mo

aware nari

ima ikutabi ka

haru ni aubeki

 

take a good look now

rather sad the petals seem

on that ancient tree

will we see them once again

in the springtime blossoming?

 

féach anois go cruinn

cuma bhrónach ar gach bláth

ar an seanchrann

cén fhaid eile a bhláthóidh siad

an mbeidh earrach eile ann?

 

Gabriel Rosenstock’s latest book is Stillness of Crows, haiku responses to the artwork of Ohara Koson

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