…some waking up haiku, renku, kanbun and waka…

The First Dream of the Year

The year’s first dream:
still in my nose –
the heart of what it is to be a flower…

– – – Chiyo Ni

    • *

…cherry blossom dream…

A snow-laden branch snaps
and from a dream of Yoshino
I awake – – –

– – – Buson

    • *

I feel it in my bones –
on this futon –
the frost this night!

– – – Buson

    • *

Sleeping alone now – – –
cold, to a frosty night
I wake up

– – – Chiyo-Ni

    • *

Suddenly –
often – I wake up…
and if I dreamed I start awake…
…still startled…
…and so sad…

– – – Princess Shikishi

    • *

– falling leaves at dawn –

Is that a winter shower –
that waking on the floor
I hear?
– – – leaves that did not make it,
blowing in the winter storm – – –

– – – Saigyo

    • *

You were with me in my dreams
and I cried out when I awoke
I tried so hard to catch your hand
but you were gone…
… …and no-one’s here…

– – – Kakimoto Hitomaro

    • *

A pale dawn moon…
and the rooster
makes me sad:  I slept so long!
– – – oh now I remember! – – – …
as I lie here on my pillow…

Princess Shikishi

    • *

The plum blossoms’ scent
awakes me again and again…
in the spring night’s darkness…
I – – – want – – – him – – – so…

– – – Izumi Shikibu

    • *

To be alive and in this world!
…to wake up full of joy!!!
…and in the cold, cold rain…

– – – Shosa

    • *

“Who is that awake?” – – –
The lamp in deepest night,
the cold winter rain…

– – – Ryota

    • *

“Come sleep,” calls the husband,
waking up,
– the distant sound of the fulling block…

– Taigi

    • *

Oil frozen,
the nightlight almost burned out –
– – – I’m awake again…

– – – Basho

    • *

– on waking up disorientated –

“The out-house is out here,”
calls a horse, –
and the night is so cold!

– – – Issa

    • *

It must be frost outside…
…pale sheet…the vacant space beside me…
…can’t get back to sleep – – –

– – – Soin

    • *

Loneliness –
a falling emptiness in the pit of the stomach –
sleet falling – – – falling – – – –

– – – Joso

    • *

…from the Saikontan…

Hearing in the quiet night the sound of a bell,
I wake from a dream within a dream –
Gazing in a clear pool, at the moon’s reflection,
I  see the body outside of my body – – –

    • *

…seeing again an old friend…

In the time it takes to be getting dark…
…I’ve fallen in love again
with the bell whose sound at daybreak
woke me
from a night of dreams…

– – – Shotetsu

    • *

So fast you can’t see
that it has no form:
a lightning flash
wakes me
from dreaming up a song…

– – – Fujiwara no Teika

    • *

And in my dreams:
if, what I see, I do not think real…
when I awake:
what use was it to dream?

– – – Shotetsu

    • *

In a little grass hut
As I fall asleep, and as I wake
I say:
“Namu Shakamuni Butsu:
Kaerimi tamae…”

– – – Dogen Eihei

    • *

Wake up! wake up!
I want to be your friend – – –
– – – sleeping butterfly!!!

– – – Basho

    • *

A spring night’s dream –
and when the floating bridge
is broken – the peaks
are tearing trails of clouds
in the clear dawn sky – – –

– – – Fujiwara no Teika

    • *

Suddenly awake,
deep, deep in the mountains –
Sun over the ridge:

daybreak in the valley –
autumn in the moon – – –

– – – Sozei

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