Sound Studies:  蝉





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閑かさや
岩にしみ入る
蝉の声

しづかさや
いはにしみいる
せみのこゑ



shizukasa ya
iwa ni shimi-iru
semi no koe


Quietness—
Sinking into the rocks,
A cicada’s cry.
Ueda, Basho, 52
stillness—
sinking deep into the rocks
cries of the cicada
Shirane, Traces of Dreams, 228
the stillness—
seeping into the rocks
cicadas’ screechUeda, Basho and His Interpreters, 249
How still it is here—
Stinging into the stones,
The locusts’ trill.
Keene, Narrow Road, 99

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On Teaching Poetry
Robert Haas, American Poet
US Poet Laureate, 1995 - 1997

“That’s one of the first things poetry is:  the physical structure of the actual breath of a given utterance and its emotion…

So the aliveness of poetry begins [as] it enters our bodies...through its ryhtmic character. 

We take in, put on, the physical breath of the spoken utterance.”
 

    shaa - shaa      jii - jiri - jiri      kana - kana - kana      oushii - tsuku - tsuku        miin - minminmin        chii - chii    
    


More about cicada songs here

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