Japanese Poet Quotes

Tadamichi Kuribayashi
Daisaku Ikeda
Takuboku Ishikawa
Ikkyū

In this dream world
We doze
And talk of dreams —
Dream, dream on,
As much as you wish

When you see an object, it seems that you see it as an entire thing first, and only afterwards do its details follow on. But for people with autism, the details jump straight out at us first of all, and then only gradually, detail by detail, does the whole image float up into focus.

Bishop Köyu said (it seems to me very admirably), 'It is only a person of poor understanding who wishes to arrange things in complete sets. It is incompleteness that is desirable.' In everything regularity is bad. To leave a thing unfinished gives interest, and makes for lengthened life. They say that even in building the [imperial] palace an unfinished place is always left. In the writings of the ancients, inner and outer [Buddhist and non-Buddhist], there are many missing chapters and parts.

The battle is approaching its end. Since the enemy's landing, even the gods would weep at the bravery of the officers and men under my command. … [My] men died one by one, and I regret very much that I have allowed the enemy to occupy a piece of Japanese territory.

Tadamichi Kuribayashi
Tadamichi Kuribayashi
To make a fortune some assistance from fate is essential. Ability alone is insufficient.

The universe and its beings are a complementarity of empty infinity, intimate interrelationships, and total uniqueness of each and every being.

It has the original mouth but remains wordless;
It is surrounded by a magnificent mound of hair.
Sentient beings can get completely lost in it
But it is also the birthplace of all the Buddhas of the ten thousand worlds.

Ikkyū
Ikkyū
Don't kill!... The fly is asking you To save his life By rubbing his hands together

The flow of the river is ceaseless and its water is never the same. The bubbles that float in the pools, now vanishing, now forming, are not of long duration: so in the world are man and his dwellings.... [People] die in the morning, they are born in the evening, like foam on the water.

What is defeat in life? It is not merely making a mistake; defeat means giving up on yourself in the midst of difficulty. What is true success in life? True success means winning in your battle with yourself. Those who persist in the pursuit of their dreams, no matter what the hurdles, are winners in life, for they have won over their weaknesses.

Daisaku Ikeda
Daisaku Ikeda
Like to a stone
That rolls down a hill,
I have come to this day.

Takuboku Ishikawa
Takuboku Ishikawa
The flowers withered,
Their color faded away,
While meaninglessly I spent my days in the world And the long rains were falling.

This piercing cold I feel:
my dead wife's comb, in our bedroom
under my heel...

Unnoticed, the passage has occurred; as I brood, autumn dusk dewdrops fall on my pillow. The voices of insects and the deer by the fence, as one, disturb me to tears this autumn dusk.

Your true self is beyond either relying on others or avoiding them in order to know who you are.

At a department store in Kyoto One of my friends bought a beetle For his son, seven years old. A few hours later The boy brought his dead bug To a hardware store, asking "Change battery please."