吉崎詣 Yoshizaki Mōde 1762 (when she was sixty years old)
Around the twentieth of March, when going on a trip to Yoshizaki, the wind was blowing especially hard in Fukushima and Matsubara. So I was relieved to finally reach an inn at Komatsu:
いふことも 羽でととのふ こてふ哉 iu koto mo hane de totonou kochō kana
what the butterfly* wants to say—only this movement of its wings
*butterfly: Chiyo-ni may be referring to a real butterfly as well as herself here: perhaps she feels tired from her trip so she cannot speak, and perhaps also feels humble so she hesitates to begin writing her haibun.
The next morning, I went to Imae-Kata, and close by there I visited a poet who owns Auchi hermitage. After hearing his haiku I was so inspired I couldn't stop making my own haiku:
水鏡 見るそだちなし 蜆取 mizu kagami miru sodachi nashi shijimi tori
rarely looking at her reflection in the water— the shellfish catcher
吉崎詣 Yoshizaki Mōde
1762 (when she was sixty years old)
Around the twentieth of March, when going on a trip to Yoshizaki, the wind was blowing especially hard in Fukushima and Matsubara. So I was relieved to finally reach an inn at Komatsu:
*butterfly: Chiyo-ni may be referring to a real butterfly as well as herself here: perhaps she feels tired from her trip so she cannot speak, and perhaps also feels humble so she hesitates to begin writing her haibun.
The next morning, I went to Imae-Kata, and close by there I visited a poet who owns Auchi hermitage. After hearing his haiku I was so inspired I couldn't stop making my own haiku: