5. The "Shadows" and "Echoes" in the Works of the Leading Poets of the World

In the 21st century, Eastern silence may be regarded more important. Claudel brought the French language closest to silence in his poem

the sound of water
on water
the shadow of a leaf
on the leaf

while Ozaki Hosai expressed the loneliness of man in the very short haiku

seki o shite mo
hitori

even if I cough,
I am alone

Edgar Allen Poe stated that "long poems are contradictions in terms. When the poem is short, the reader must be able to understand the silence.

From a universal standpoint, haiku is a symbolic poem, but the meanings of the symbols are completely different in each cultural context. For example, Yosa Buson symbolized sorrow in a wild rose by saying,

urei tsutsu
oka ni noboreba
hanaibara

lamenting
going up to the hill -
wild roses

hanaibara
kokyo no michi ni
nitaru kana

wild roses
the path is like
my home town's

michi taete
ka ni semari saku
ibara kana

the path ends
the fragrance draws near
wild roses

But in "Wild Rose," Goethe simply poeticized a maiden. In the West, "lilac" symbolized resistance, but in Japan this flower did not symbolize any such idea. The clear image presented in Basho's haiku,

kare-eda ni
karasu no tomari keri
aki no kure

on a bare branch
a crow perches
in the autumn twilight

This haiku is praised in the West for exemplifying the preconceived concept of the Japanese esthetic.

araumi ya
sado ni yokotau
ama no gawa

rough sea
the Milky Way is crossing over
to Sado

This haiku, on the other hand, is very difficult to understand unless one knows the history of Sado Island. However, communication between different cultures through haiku symbols between different cultures have already started. In haiku, an object is concretely expressed as a symbol. The symbol is suggestive enough to allow non-Japanese poets to understand, and use it in their own poem.

In Basho's poems we find surrealistic works such as

kumo no mine
ikutsu kuzure te
tsuki no yama

So many cumulus clouds
crumbling into
a moon-crowned mountain.

shizukasa ya
iwa ni shimiiru
semi no koe

stillness
cicadas' cry penetrating
the rocks

ishiyama no
ishiyori shiroshi
aki no kaze

the rocks are whiter
than the stones of the Ishiyama Temple...
autumn wind

umi kurete
kamo no koe
honoka ni shiroshi

sea at dusk
the sound of wild ducks
slightly white

We have modern works by Nomura Toshiro such as

shimo hakishi
houki shibaraku shite
taoru

a while
after sweeping the frost
the broom fell

Basho's "kumo no mine ikutsu kuzure te tsuki no yama" offers a typical example of sophisticated symbols. The cumulus cloud is life, man and light, while the moon-crowned mountain symbolizes death, woman and shadow. The haiku describes "cumulus clouds" on a summer day crumbling as time goes by. That scene changes to that of the moon-crowned mountain in the autumn evening. This is a highly symbolic haiku. Toshiro's work, on the other hand, is simply about a broom that falls. But after the broom swept the limpid frost, it falls in a stopping motion and a mystic tranquility arises from this everyday scene. These excellent haiku are both on the border between abstract and concrete expressions. This creates a mystical quality. Good haiku presents life bursting with energy, while transcending life and death. Imoto Noichi advocated the irony of haiku, but Shiki boldly went beyond irony on to nonsense or Dadaism in his haiku

keito no
juushi-go hon mo
arinu beshi

cockscombs
must be fourteen
or fifteen there

Surrealism was heralded at the start of the century in France, but could it be that the Japanese have long had a natural proclivity for surrealism?

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