Are these three lines really separate elements, or is the third line a comment on the first two? I can imagine a “therefore” in front of the third line.
I don’t see a ‘therefore…’ , an ‘explanation.’ The third element seems a continuing extension of the first two: nearby moon, further stars, and what the poet sees as the endless background. But readers may read things differently.
The third in this week of multipart haiku:
月一輪 星無数 空みどりかな tsuki ichi-rin hoshi musū sora midori kana — Shiki
月 tsuki moon 一 ichi one (the number) 輪 rin wheel or circle, counter for flowers or round objects (ichi-rin is a flowery description of the glowing full moon) 星 hoshi stars 無 mu prefix indicating without 数 sū number musū (or mukazu) means myriad, innumerable, countless 空 sora sky みどり midori green (also suggests blue-green, verdigris, the colour of the deep ocean) かな kana, the cutting word at the end of the line, is a soft exclamation of awe, a sigh of wonder, inviting the reader to share Shiki’s vision, his emotion, to contemplate the verse. Here, to contemplate the universe…
one full moon myriad stars green heavens… Or: One full moon, stars numberless, the sky dark green… —tr. Henderson
One of Shiki’s celebrated haiku in Japan. The awe and wonder of our expanding universe seen from Earth, sketched out for you.
Another haiku with three separate elements. The technique of retsuji-hō is sometimes referred to somewhat dismissively by anglophone haikuists as “list haiku.” (retsu = to line up, arrange in a row, enumerate; ji = character, word; hō = method)
It is not a two-part, fragment-and-phrase haiku. It is not a verse with a juxtaposition across a marked cut that suggests a comparison. This verse again exhibits the harmonious arrangement of separate but related things (toriawase). There are semantic cuts as you read, that separate the different elements. It is a shasei, from observation; a Buson-like painting of this celestial scene and all it contains, from our moon, to the countless stars beyond, in the night sky of autumn, a deep blue-green. By the way, the ‘green heavens’ is unlikely to be the aurora, which reaches to Japan extremely rarely (I checked) and, had he seen it, the aurora would surely have been mentioned in Shiki’s diary and in Japanese commentary on the verse.
Considering the haiku, Henderson notes apropos such haiku that “The relationship does not, of course, have to be between just two things. It may be between three things….or it may be between different aspects of the same thing.” (Haiku in English pp 56-7)
—– For this technique to work, awareness and revelation arise from the intuited relationship between the separate elements, which work together harmoniously so that perception and meaning is accumulated. The whole becomes more than the sum of the separate elements. A plain shopping list that does not accumulate surplus meaning, won’t work.
Are these three lines really separate elements, or is the third line a comment on the first two? I can imagine a “therefore” in front of the third line.
I don’t see a ‘therefore…’ , an ‘explanation.’ The third element seems a continuing extension of the first two: nearby moon, further stars, and what the poet sees as the endless background. But readers may read things differently.
The third in this week of multipart haiku:
月一輪 星無数 空みどりかな
tsuki ichi-rin hoshi musū sora midori kana
— Shiki
月 tsuki moon
一 ichi one (the number)
輪 rin wheel or circle, counter for flowers or round objects
(ichi-rin is a flowery description of the glowing full moon)
星 hoshi stars
無 mu prefix indicating without
数 sū number
musū (or mukazu) means myriad, innumerable, countless
空 sora sky
みどり midori green (also suggests blue-green, verdigris, the colour of the deep ocean)
かな kana, the cutting word at the end of the line, is a soft exclamation of awe, a sigh of wonder, inviting the reader to share Shiki’s vision, his emotion, to contemplate the verse. Here, to contemplate the universe…
one full moon myriad stars green heavens…
Or:
One full moon,
stars numberless, the sky
dark green…
—tr. Henderson
One of Shiki’s celebrated haiku in Japan. The awe and wonder of our expanding universe seen from Earth, sketched out for you.
Another haiku with three separate elements. The technique of retsuji-hō is sometimes referred to somewhat dismissively by anglophone haikuists as “list haiku.” (retsu = to line up, arrange in a row, enumerate; ji = character, word; hō = method)
It is not a two-part, fragment-and-phrase haiku. It is not a verse with a juxtaposition across a marked cut that suggests a comparison. This verse again exhibits the harmonious arrangement of separate but related things (toriawase). There are semantic cuts as you read, that separate the different elements. It is a shasei, from observation; a Buson-like painting of this celestial scene and all it contains, from our moon, to the countless stars beyond, in the night sky of autumn, a deep blue-green. By the way, the ‘green heavens’ is unlikely to be the aurora, which reaches to Japan extremely rarely (I checked) and, had he seen it, the aurora would surely have been mentioned in Shiki’s diary and in Japanese commentary on the verse.
Considering the haiku, Henderson notes apropos such haiku that “The relationship does not, of course, have to be between just two things. It may be between three things….or it may be between different aspects of the same thing.” (Haiku in English pp 56-7)
—–
For this technique to work, awareness and revelation arise from the intuited relationship between the separate elements, which work together harmoniously so that perception and meaning is accumulated. The whole becomes more than the sum of the separate elements. A plain shopping list that does not accumulate surplus meaning, won’t work.