Learn the rules, and then forget them.
MATSUO BASHOBefore enlightenment, chopping wood and carrying water. After enlightenment, chopping wood and carrying water.
More Matsuo Basho Quotes
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Learn how to listen as things speak for themselves.
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Sadly, I part from you; Like a clam torn from its shell, I go, and autumn too.
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The sea darkens And a wild duck s call Is faintly white.
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An autumn night – don’t think your life didn’t matter.
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Old pond, frog jumps in – plop.
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There is nothing you can see that is not a flower; there is nothing you can think that is not the moon.
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Every moment of life is the last, every poem is a death poem.
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All my friends / viewing the moon – / an ugly bunch.
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How I long to see among dawn flowers, the face of God.
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Old pond, leap-splash – a frog.
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Poverty’s child – he starts to grind the rice, and gazes at the moon.
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A flute with no holes is not a flute.
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Nothing in the cry of cicadas suggests they are about to die.
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There came a day when the clouds drifting along with the wind aroused a wanderlust in me, and I set off on a journey to roam along the seashores
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Do not resemble me-Never be like a musk melon Cut in two identical halves.
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The moon and sun are travelers through eternity. Even the years wander on. Whether drifting through life on a boat or climbing toward old age leading a horse, each day is a journey, and the journey itself is home.
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Spring rain conveyed under the trees in drops.
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From the pine tree, learn of the pine tree; And from the bamboo, of the bamboo.
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Go to the object. Leave your subjective preoccupation with yourself. Do not impose yourself on the object. Become one with the object. Plunge deep enough into the object to see something like a hidden glimmering there.
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Make the universe your companion, always bearing in mind the true nature of things-mountains and rivers, trees and grasses, and humanity-and enjoy the falling blossoms and the scattering leaves.
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From all these trees, in the salads, the soup, everywhere, cherry blossoms fall.
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The oak tree: not interested in cherry blossoms.
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Every day is a journey, and the journey itself is home.
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When composing a verse let there not be a hair’s breath separating your mind from what you write; composition of a poem must be done in an instant, like a woodcutter felling a huge tree or a swordsman leaping at a dangerous enemy.
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The moon is brighter since the barn burned.
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At the ancient pond the frog plunges into the sound of water.
MATSUO BASHO