Kobayashi Issa
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FollowAbout Kobayashi Issa
One of the four great masters of Japanese haiku, and the most human of them — the poems are full of flies, fleas, frogs, sparrows and small creatures addressed as equals, in a voice that is comic and grieving at once.
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His life was a catalogue of losses, including several children, and the most famous poems are about exactly that: a world of dew, and yet. The plainness is deceptive and the humour is not decoration. In English he is read through many competing translations, and comparing two or three is the fastest way to see what the original is doing.
Read next
- Gary Snyder — The Japanese tradition in American English.
- Jane Hirshfield — A translator from the Japanese tradition.
- Kenneth Rexroth — Who brought this poetry into American English.
7 poems
04/28/2026 14:58h
Under the evening moon
the snail
is stripped to the waist.
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04/28/2026 14:58h
The snow is melting
and the village is flooded
with children.
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04/28/2026 14:58h
On a branch
floating downriver
a cricket, singing.
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04/28/2026 14:58h
Mosquito at my ear—
does he think
I’m deaf?
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04/28/2026 14:58h
Goes out,
comes back—
the love life of a cat.
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04/28/2026 14:58h
Even with insects—
some can sing,
some can’t.
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04/28/2026 14:58h
All the time I pray to Buddha
I keep on
killing mosquitoes.
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