Cluster Four:
Cherry Blossoms

Here are three haiku about sakura, cherry blossoms. We start with Basho's confusion among the blossoms, which make him so drunk with their visual power that he can not discern between the bells of Ueno and Asakusa anymore. In the second haiku he suddenly sees the magnificent roof of Sensoji, soaring above the blossoms...

The third haiku is by Shushiki, a thirteen-year old poetess who was the disciple of Kikaku, who again studied with Basho. Fitting for Ueno, which is still the prime blossom-viewing spot in central Tokyo, she also writes about cherry blossoms and her fear for the fate of those fragile petals still holds true...

In the Edo-period, temple bells such as the one on the Benten Hill in Sensoji in Asakusa, played an important role in informing the townspeople of the time of day. Those bells were therefore called 'toki no kane,' or Bells of Time. The present bell dates from 1692, when it was cast at the orders of the shogun Tsunayoshi. The bell is more than 2 meters high and measures one and half meter in diameter.

Basho lived in Fukagawa, on the other bank of the River Sumida. In those times, when Fukagawa was in the rural outskirts of the city, he could probably see the roof of the great Kannon temple from his home. Not far from Asakusa was another temple complex, Kaneiji, in what is now Ueno Park. Kaneiji also possessed a Bell of Time, now standing in a forlorn corner of the park. Basho could hear both temple bells. Sitting on the verandah of his house, among the blossoms of spring, he heard the boom of a bell... and wondered: was it the one of Kaneiji in Ueno or of the Kannon temple in Asakusa? Basho was so visually drunk with the rioting blossoms that even his sense of direction became confused...

This haiku has been engraved on a kuhi standing left of the stairs leading to the Benten Shrine in the grounds of Sensoji. It is a sort of sequel to the previous haiku, where Basho was only listening, drunk with blossoms. Now he is looking and there, above the clouds of cherry blossoms, he sees the impressive tiled roof of the great Kannon Temple in Asakusa, Sensoji...

Ueno was and still is famous for its cherry blossoms. The inhabitants of the city turn out in large numbers at blossom-viewing time, so that a visit to the park has more the character of 'people-viewing.' Groups sit under the trees, showered upon by the falling blossoms. People eat and, especially, drink, and the sake is responsible for quite a hilarious atmosphere. This despite the fact that in the Edo-period Ueno was the site of solemn Kaneiji, the funerary temple of the Tokugawa.

Interestingly, there is a connection between temple and cherry trees: the trees were planted by the third shogun Tokugawa Iemitsu (1604-1651), in commemoration of Tenkai, the priest who had established Kaneiji. The trees were brought from the famous cherry blossom viewing area of Yoshino, in present-day Nara Prefecture.

Jolliness is not always good for tender blossoms and slender trees. This was already noted by Oaki, the 13 year-old daughter of a sweet shop in Nihonbashi, who wrote haiku under the literary name of 'Shushiki.' The poem, written in the Genroku area (1688-1704), became famous in the whole city. Oaki was a pupil of Kikaku, who in his turn had studied under Basho.

Whether the well on the photo is really Shushiki's original well, is rather questionable - to say nothing about the cherry tree standing at its side. But through the centuries the small poem still speaks to us in all freshness.