"Haiku Reflections"
The topic of this installment of the Field Guide is reflections and, by extension, mirrors. People have been delighted, impressed, and even frightened by the reflection of objects and living creatures since earliest times. The physical reflection of the moon on still water, the apparition of one’s face in a mirror, and the image of the world in reverse are all quite uncanny. So much so that people have looked to reflections for deeper significance: perhaps an inventory of one’s youthful good looks or advancing years, advice to the lovelorn, explanations of the past, and prognostications of things to come. Reflections are truly magic.
Neither “reflection” nor “mirror” are standard Japanese seasonal words (kigo), but topics such as these were common in classical Japanese haiku. Objects, especially celestial bodies were a favorite topic, for example:
火花せよ淀の御茶屋の夕月夜
hanabi seyo yodo no ochaya no yūzukiyo
Fireworks
reflected in a teahouse pool—
the moonlit eveningBuson, trans. Allan Persinger,
Foxfire: the Selected Poems of Yosa Buson (2013)
. . .
