Short Poems

Sent to a woman:
Very well —
but at least let me
hope for favor
in some life to come,
I who now suffer beyond enduring

One-sided love:
Even I hate
this sorry self of mine —
so hate me,
and I'll know we share
at least that emotion

Looking over poems by persons of long ago when compiling the anthology Senzaishu :
Years to come
will there be those
who wish they'd known me too? —
like me, letting their mind
dwell on the past

Dawn:
On my boxwood pillow
I strain to catch it —
the sad note of the temple bell
telling us it's dawn

Congratulations:
Our lord's reign —
I would not have it
be a thousand years,
but endless as the moon and sun
coming out from heaven's door

" Not a bird singing, the mountain is all the more quiet " :
A noise: a scarecrow fell by itself

Meeting Etsujin:
A handsome face drinking water — this autumn moon

Living alone:
I hug myself and again it's hard to breathe in the cold of night

The fifteenth of the eighth month:
If only my heart were as it is normally — today's moon!

O'er all the hill-tops
Is quiet now,
In all the tree-tops
Hearest thou
Hardly a breath;
The birds are asleep in the trees:
Wait; soon like these
Thou too shalt rest.