half-asleep on horseback
half-dreaming the moon far off,
smoke from morning tea-fires
- Matsuo Basho
10 November, 2009
Dozing on Horseback
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half-asleep on horseback
half-dreaming the moon far off,
smoke from morning tea-fires
5 comments:
I think it's 'horse', not 'horseback' - so much gets lost in the translation of this junky slang
;)
Hmmm.. better to be on the horse's back than it's front when one is half asleep.
Dear Anonymous,
There are as many translations of this classic haiku as there are translators - thanks for adding yours. I subscribe to the Ezra Pound school of translating Oriental poems - beauty and rigour are often at odds in a translation, and it is the task of the translator not merely to render something into another language, but to attempt conveyance of its spirit.
(I should add that I do not read Japanese, and that this is most definitely not my work - rather, it is the most appealing to me of very many translations of this Basho classic.)
Toodlepip,
Hobbes
The moon was closer to this horseman than he ever dreamed.
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