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In the cherry blossom's shade

Kobayashi Issa, Kobayashi Issa poetry, Buddhist, Buddhist poetry, Zen / Chan poetry, [TRADITION SUB2] poetry,  poetry by Kobayashi Issa
(1763 - 1828) Timeline

English version by
Robert Hass

Original Language
Japanese

Buddhist : Zen / Chan
18th Century

In the cherry blossom's shade
there's no such thing
as a stranger.

 

 

-- from The Enlightened Heart: An Anthology of Sacred Poetry, by Stephen Mitchell

Amazon.com

 

Themes

  Spring Blossom
 
 
 
 


Recommended Books


A Box of Zen: Haiku the Poetry of Zen, Koans the Lessons of Zen, Sayings the Wisdom of Zen, Edited by Manuela Dunn Mascetti / Edited by Timothy Hugh Barrett
The Enlightened Heart: An Anthology of Sacred Poetry, by Stephen Mitchell
The Poetry of Zen: (Shambhala Library), Edited by Sam Hamill / Edited by J. P. Seaton
Zen Poetry: Let the Spring Breeze Enter, Translated by Lucien Stryk / Translated by Takashi Ikemoto

 

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Commentary by Ivan M. Granger

In Japanese Zen poetry, spring blossoms, particularly cherry blossoms, are often used as symbols for the simple, natural, unfolding springtime of enlightenment.

Understanding this, the rest of the poem opens up.

In the "shade" or, you might say, beneath the canopy of enlightenment, there is no longer any sense of separation. Nothing and no one is foreign to you. There is no such thing as a stranger.

 

 


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