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Fukuda Chiyo-ni Haiku

Fukuda Chiyo-ni (1703-1775) was a celebrated Japanese poet and painter of the Edo period, also known as Kaga no Chiyo.

CHIYO-NI POEMS ABOUT WOMEN AND DESIRE

How alarming:
her scarlet fingernails
tending the white chrysanthemums!
—Chiyo-ni, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Moonflowers blossoming:
a woman’s nakedness
—Chiyo-ni, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Moonflowers:
a woman glows
as she disrobes
—Fukuda Chiyo-ni, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

A woman’s desire:
wild violets’
entangled roots
—Chiyo-ni, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

A woman’s passion
flowers from the roots:
wild violets.
—Chiyo-ni (1705-1775), loose translation by Michael R. Burch

My painted lips
purified:
crystalline springwater
—Chiyo-ni, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Her day off:
the prostitute wakes
to a frigid morning.
—Chiyo-ni, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Isn’t it good
to wake up alone,
unencumbered?
—Chiyo-ni, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

She wakes up
alone,
unencumbered.
—Chiyo-ni, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Her body-debt paid
she wakes alone:
a frigid night.
—Chiyo-ni, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

CHIYO-NI FAMILY POEMS

Upon her engagement to the servant of a samurai:

Will it be bitter,
the first time I bite
an unripe persimmon?
—Chiyo-ni, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

This poem was apparently written for her only son, who died:

My little dragonfly hunter:
how far away has he wandered
I wonder?
—Chiyo-ni, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Her husband died when she was 27 years old:

Rising, I see,
and reclining I see
the web of the mosquito netting ...
—Chiyo-ni, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

My elderly parents
become my children:
strident cicadas
—Chiyo-ni, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

At the sight of the distant moon
silence enters the heart.
—Chiyo-ni, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

The squatting frog
studies the clouds
—Chiyo-ni, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Keywords/Tags: Fukuda Chiyo-ni, Japan, Japanese, haiku, English translation, woman, women, desire, passion, violets, flower, nun, temple, loss, loneliness, moon, butterfly, morning glories, wife, husband, son, mother son, family, parents
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