open sky :: SAMVAAD | 30th July
- sanjuktaa
- Jul 30, 2023
- 1 min read
hosts : Sanjuktaa Asopa & Kashiana Singh
Samidare ni
tsuru no ashi
mijikaku nareri
In the seasonal rain
a crane's legs
have become short
(Translated by Makoto Ueda)
In this season's rain
the crane's long legs
have suddenly been shortened
(Trans. by Sam Hamill )
---- Matsuo Basho
(Narrow Road to the Interior)
This is a beauty, Sanjuktaa. And giving two translations is another brilliant idea.
I was under the impression that a majority of poems in Basho's Narrow Road were trans;lated as four lines. How is that this is in 3 lines?
Keiko,
Could you through some light on this?
Why did that happen?
V interesting take on the ku!
Nice!!
Love this Basho’s haiku image and his unique observation.
Just for your information, “samidare(五月雨)“ is an old summer kigo and literally means May rain. It’s a long spell of rain in May(in the old((lunar)) calendar), which is actually from late June through mid July in the current calendar. So I understand why Makoto Ueda translated it as “seasonal rain” instead of May rain.