Nozawa Boncho and Ukoo

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Nozawa Boncho 野沢凡兆

寛永17年（1640年）？ - 正徳4年（1714年））

(野沢凡兆, Nozawa Bonchoo) was a Japanese poet born c.1640 in Kanazawa. He spent most of his life in Kyoto working as a doctor. Boncho was one of Matsuo Basho's disciples and wrote many famous haiku and renku of his period. Boncho died in 1714.

This is perhaps Boncho's most famous haiku:

The brushwood,
Though cut for fuel,
Is beginning to bud.


市中は物のにほひや夏の月
ichinaka wa mono no nioi ya natsu no tsuki

Downtown
the smells of things . . .
summer moon
(tr. Sean Price)

©　More in the WIKIPEDIA !


Throughout the town
above the welter of smelly things
the summer moon
Tr. Earl Miner


In the town
smells of things
under a summer moon.
Tr. Mayhew

. . . . .



shimo kyoo ya ...


Further reading : Ichinaka wa – Downtown - Haikai



Nozawa Boncho / further reference

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上行くと下来る雲や秋の空
ue yuku to shita kuru kumo ya aki no sora

clouds floating above
and clouds floating below -
autumn sky

. Haiku about Sky (sora, ten)




禅寺の松の落葉や神無月
zendera ni matsu no ochiba ya kannazuki

In the Zen temple,
Pine needles are falling;
The god-less month.
tr. Blyth

Haiku about the god-less month




たけの子や畠隣に悪太郎
take no ko ya hatake tonari ni aku taroo

bamboo shoots -
beside the fields
such unwelcome company
Tr. Gabi Greve

"aku taroo", bad taroo, bad first son, villain ...


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from Sarumino

灰汁桶の雫やみけりきりぎりす
aku-oke no shizuku yami-keri kirigirisu

the alkaline water tub
stopped dripping -
grashoppers



(These kinds of wooden tubs were used to get the bitterness out of food items, such as horse chestnuts. They were also used for dyeing cloth.)




鶯や下駄の歯につく小田の土
uguisu ya geta no ha ni tsuki oda no tsuchi


下京や雪つむ上の夜の雨
ShimoKyoo ya yuki tsumu ue no yoru no ame


呼かへす鮒売みえぬあられ哉

鶏の声もきこゆるやま桜

桐の木の風にかまはぬ落葉かな


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His wife was Tome, 野沢とめ
Haiku name: Ukoo, 羽紅(うこう).


縫物や着もせでよごす五月雨
nuimono ya ki mo sede yogosu satsukiame

The embroidered dress
though not yet worn already soiled
by summer rain
trans. Earl Miner and Hiroko Odagiri


The needlework,--
Soiled without wearing it,
In the rains of June.
trans. Blyth


Miner and Odagiri say they follow the interpretation that "dampness has produced some mold on her clothes. The reason she has not worn them is that from 1682 to 1689 sumptuary laws forbade people not of the aristocracy or warrior classes to wear certain kinds of dress. Perhaps a slight critical tone here?"


And Blyth says:
"This is haiku in that the wetting of the garment brings out the meaning of the rain, but the clothes were perhaps more important to her than the rain."

Compiled by Larry Bole
Translating Haiku Forum




this needlework--
spoiled before it's even worn
by June rains' dampness

Tr. Larry Bole


The following was also compiled by Larry:

Here are some things that Earl Miner and Hiroko Odagiri say about her in their translation of "The Monkey's Straw Raincoat" (Sarumino):

Ukoo (d. ca. 1716-35) lay name Tome. Surname unknown. She was born in Kyoto, lived in Osaka, and married Bonchoo, taking orders as a result of ill health and perhaps for freedom of movement as a poet. In 1689 she appeared as a poet in 'Arano' ["The Uncleared Moor"--one of the seven collections ('Shichibushuu) that best represent the Basho-school of haikai].

Her care of Basho while at Kyorai's hermitage moved the master to comment in his 'Saga Nikki'. Although not the poetic equal of her husband she is one of the finest poets in 'Sarumino' and suitably appears in the 'Ume Wakana' ["Plum Blossoms and Fresh Shoots"--Ume Wakana no Maki, 1690] sequences as well as in the hokku parts.
[end of biographical statement]

Here are Ukoo's hokku from the four opening hokku sequences in "The Monkey's Straw Raincoat," all translated by Miner and Odagiri:

damasareshi hoshi no hikari ya sayo shigure (#11, Winter)

The stars that sparkled
have now been put to silence
drizzle in the night



shimoyake no te o fuite yaru yukimaroge (#70, Winter)

Where they are chilblained
the mother blows her child's hands
smarting from snow

(from the translators' note: Whether or not she is writing about their daughter Tei, Ukoo's use of "yaru" implies a mother's actions for her child, who here has been playing in the snow.)



odooshi ya te no okaretaru hitogokoro (#91, Winter)

The last days of the year
they sit with hands upon their knees
anxious in thought

(from the translators' note: Ukoo shows sympathy for debtors in hiding as year's end bills fall due. If they had money, their hands would be busy in preparations for the season...)



iriai no hibiki no naka ya hototogisu (#102, Summer)

The temple bell at dusk
reverberates with its singing
the hototogisu

(translators' note: The implications are variously taken. Our interpretation suggests a lovely description of mingled sounds, rather than the bell sounding evanescence with the bird's song giving joy.)

[Blyth's translation:

Through the tolling
Of the evening bell
The cry of the hototogisu.]



nuimono ya...(#142, Summer--for translation see above)



yuugao ni yobarete tsuraki atsusa kana (#179, Summer)

For some hot gourd soup
the invitation is a strain
in full summer heat

(translators' note: "Tsuraki" ("strain") governs what goes before and comes after.)



mayoigo no oya no kokoro ya susukihara (#211, Autumn)

Her child gone astray
she worries with a mother's heart
the wide pampas field

(translator's note: This seems sentimental if just. But the frequent personification of these tall grasses [in hokku] is now in a manner reversed. The mother must take on the pliancy and readiness of the plant if she is to find her child.)



tsuki mireba hito no kinuta ni isogawashi (#239, Autumn)

As I look on the moon
the women fulling cloth are heard
at their busy work

(from the translators' note: She implies that the women at their labor also see the moon. ...)
Fulling block (kinuta)



harusame no agaru ya noki ni naku suzume (#330, Spring)

The light spring rains
seem to lift so now the eaves
have sparrows twittering



momo yanagi kubari ariku ya onna no ko (#335, Spring)

She goes to distribute
extra peach flowers and willow strands
a happy young girl

(translators' note: Having received so much in this line for the doll festival, the good-hearted child walks about to share things with her friends.)



"Being weak in body and given to ill health, I thought how hard it was to tend my hair and so changed the style this spring."

koogai mo kushi mo mukashi ya chiritsubaki (#352, Spring)

The fancy hairpins
along with combs are useless now
camellia flowers fall

(translators' note: The headnote modestly tells us that she has become a nun. Since camellias fall as whole flowers rather than petal by petal, they were associated with the human head. The stanza is poignantly sad and yet combines beauty with religious resolution.)



"On seeing illustrations of 'The Tale of Genji'."

obashima ni yoru chiru hana no tachisugara (#371, Spring)

On the balustrade
as the flowers fall in the night
he stands there radiant

(translators' note: Many commentators treat the standing form as a woman's. But in illustrations of 'The Tale of Genji', a standing woman is very rare. Genji himself must be meant.)
Genji Monogatari, The Tale of Genji 源氏物語



And finally, a well-known verse translated by Blyth:

waga ko nara tomo ni wa yaraji yoru no yuki

Were he my child,
He should not accompany you,
This night of snow!



If my child, I wouldn't let him go with you in tonight's snow
(trans. Hiroaki Sato)

Takeda (Tome) Uko-ni -- wife of Boncho and sister of Kyorai. On a wintry, slippery night, Boncho, with his 12-year-old servant boy, was about to leave for a haikai no renga party. Uko recited this poem on the spur of the moment. Boncho, awed and ashamed, went on alone."
In "The Classic Tradition of Haiku -
An Anthology, ed. Faubion Bowers"



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Related words

***** WKD : Introducing Japanese Haiku Poets

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