The opening images of her poem "Seeking A Mooring" suggest loneliness and isolation. A leaf floating in endless space may be a tranquil, meditative opening, yet this is disturbed when "a cold wind tears the clouds." The verb "tears" suggests a painful experience. The focus of the poem then moves from the leaf and the sky to the water, and the setting is situated more in time and space. We are on a river, yet things seem turned around as the "water flows westward" in the opposite direction of most rivers in China. This confusion is explained in the next line as the poet notes that the tide is pushing the water upstream. The boat seems suspended like the leaf in the first line that ought to fall.
As the focus expands away from the river, the speaker of the poem hears sounds coming from the villages she has passed. This is a sign that there are other people out there who are not as isolated as she is. They are preparing for winter as the fullers, makers of felt, pound the wet fabric to thicken it. In contrast to this comforting sound, the speaker of the poem hears crickets crying out all around her. They seem to be dying in the autumn frost, or at least they remind her of the coming winter and of death.
Perhaps this is why her thoughts "Wander in a thousand miles of dreams." Or perhaps she is thinking back on her past. She seems to lose her grip on time and place, and even the bell (which may come from her own boat or from one of the villages) can not bring her back to the present or comfort her sorrows. She wonders what she will "remember / From all this journey," what meaning her trip along the river (and by extension her trip through life) has brought her. Her answer to this question seems ambiguous. She says "Only still bands of desolate mist / And a single fishing boat." This answer could underscore her depression. The mist is certainly a melancholy, elusive think like the "sorrows that come / In the fifth hour of night." The fishing boat, however, could be seen as a more positive, comforting image.
Given the title of the poem, that she is "Seeking A Mooring," or a place
to tie up her boat, it seems that the poet is looking to find meaning in
life. She does see it as elusive, like the mist and the villages that she
passes at a distance. However, especially given her Taoist philosophy,
it is likely that this is less depressing to Wang Wei than to a Western
reader. Taoists praise nonexistence as much as existence. They value what
is useless. The paradox that life's meaning is elusive and hard to grasp
seems appropriate for this poem. While it ends on a melancholy note, it
is also serene
He was born in 1644 in Ueno, a town about 30 miles SE of Kyoto. His father was probably a low-ranking samurai warrior and part-time farmer. When Matsuo grew up, he became a samurai under the local clan leader. Together, the two began writing haiku poetry. However, when this young master died and his brother took over, Matsuo left for Kyoto, where he may have studied philosophy, poetry, and calligraphy. What is known for certain is that he began to gain fame as a poet. His haiku were included in several anthologies and he began compiling books, where he would invite other poets to compose haiku, he would add a few of his own, and he would comment on the skill of the other poets. This shows that he was becoming respected as a haiku master.
From Kyoto he moved to Edo, perhaps to further his career as a poet, though he is known to have been an official at the Edo waterworks for a time. Later he became a professional poet, gathering about ten disciples around him. He also studied Zen meditation, and he would take journeys to various cities in Japan, traveling as a wandering priest and writing haiku poems along the way, some of which he inscribed on stones and left at the place of composition. He also wrote travel narratives describing his experiences. It was on one of these celebrated journeys that Basho became ill and died in 1694.
"At the Tub of Ashes" opens with a peaceful setting, marked by the quiet sounds of dripping water and chirping crickets, though perhaps the autumn season suggests some emptiness. Basho, in the second stanza, picks up on this and adds the image of the lamp running out of oil and a man settling down to sleep on a long autumn night. Yasui adds the peaceful image of the light of the moon shining on the floormats. Our text then omits four stanzas, so that we do not know how these poets make the transition from sleep and calm to the galloping ride in stanza eight. Here the poem is full of rising energy, and the season has turned to spring. Yet the image of beautiful Mount Maya may provide some contrast to the wild ride and lack of restraint in the first three lines. In the next stanza the mountain seems a peaceful presence as the scene shifts to a simple summer supper, which brings a mood of fulfillment.
Of course, in haikai, such a mood can not last, so Basho adds a bit of humor in stanza 10 by bringing in the leech bite, an irritation that nonetheless feels good when scratched. This maintains the theme of fulfillment of the previous stanza, but treats it less seriously. It also brings in an element of suffering that Yasui picks up on in the next stanza, comparing the scratching of an itch to the satisfaction the woman feels on her day off. She wishes to forget 'throes of longing,' so obviously she can't quite forget them, though a rest brings some relief. In the next stanza this is developed when she can't forget. Her day off seems to be interrupted by a love letter demanding her return. The woman does not seem to be in a position to refuse her lord. Perhaps she is a courtesan for whom love and work are combined. In stanza 13, Basho takes this situation and twists it. Rather than feeling depressed that she has to give in to the demands of her lord, the woman feels complacent, satisfied since people tell her "she is fortune's child." We discussed that this could mean she is in the hands of fate and therefore needn't worry about making a decision, or that people tell her how luck she is to be the lover of this lord and that makes her feel better about his demands.
In the next stanza the ideas of good fortune and complacency are elaborated in the description of lounging in a hot bath and looking at the moonlight. Yet in stanza 15, Kyorai undercuts the feeling of complacency by bringing in the season of autumn, which "hastens by vacant buildings," suggesting the passing of time and the emptiness in the world around. Yasui intensifies this with the image of the "passing dew," which suggests that everything in this life, though beautiful, is also transitory. Basho compares this to the springtime cherry blossoms that will fade and fall, even as he has lost his youth and entered a time of spiritual reflection, symbolized by the "robes that tell of priestly life." Yet Boncho won't allow the spiritual mood to dominate the poem; he brings in the simple joys of priestly life with the reference to pickled greens, a local delicacy.
In the next stanzas, a theme of travel is developed. In stanza 19 the titmice are flying towards their home, while the traveler is walking in the opposite direction. This suggests the image of a human home, the peasant hut whose thatch roof has just been completed. The roofed hut then becomes a shelter from a winter storm that throws the world into disorder. Basho adds the light a host might set out to welcome the traveler in from the storm, but Kyorai's next stanza makes the light and the host's preparations useless. It appears the traveler has not arrived, as Kyorai uses the convention of "the woman waiting in vain for her faithless lover." Yasui then picks up on this sense of uselessness and of longing by adding the autumn flowers and the wolf crying for his mate.
Basho introduces the heavy theme of death with the desolate royal tomb, though this seems mitigated by the loyalty of the guard. In stanza 26, however, the emphasis shifts to the neglect of the "well holding brackish water." Yasui lightens the mood by comparing the neglected well to the "teller of tall tales" who is amusing but probably also neglected. This scene is recreated, possibly in a new location in stanza 28, as the season shifts to summer with the mention of sushi. It seems there is more respect for this storyteller. The mention of sushi brings Boncho to another summer scene, the green rice growing in the paddies of the countryside. Basho associates this scene with the Shinto shrine and "abundant divinity." In contrast to the Buddhist spirituality of the priestly robes mentioned earlier, this spirituality seems rooted in the cycles of the seasons.
Yet again, Kyorai disrupts the spiritual message, reminding us that life goes on with the image of the peddler hawking his wares. In 32, Yasui reminds us that life is characterized by constant change and we have only momentary shelter from the rain. Yet Basho takes this notion of shelter and combines it with the poised image of the heron sleeping. Boncho brings in the motion of the water, yet the sound it makes is a peaceful one. This brings a sense of fulfillment found in the image of spring cherry blossoms, and the poem ends with a spring dawn and a sense of peace and hope.
We noted the cyclical nature of this poem, how the sounds and the mood of the first stanzas are reflected in the final sequence, though in the beginning there was a sense of emptiness in autumn and in the end there is fullness and springtime. Similarly themes of peace and longing, spirituality and physical pleasure, and uselessness and meaning are repeated with variations through the poem. Most of the imagery comes from the natural world, so one might compare the use of imagery and the moods that are presented to those found in the European Romantic poets or to Wang Wei's "Seeking a Mooring."