174 Quotes by Matsuo Bashō

Come, butterfly It’s late- We’ve miles to go together.

If I had the knack I’d sing like Cherry flakes falling.

Old pond, leap-splash – a frog.

Poverty’s child – he starts to grind the rice, and gazes at the moon.

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.

Nothing in the cry of cicadas suggests they are about to die.

Felling a tree and gazing at the cut end – tonight’s moon.

Year by year, the monkey’s mask reveals the monkey.

From the pine tree, learn of the pine tree; And from the bamboo, of the bamboo.