Source: Donald Keene's Anthology of Japanese Literature (1955), p. 78
Hito ni awamu Tsuki no naki yo wa Omoiokite Mune hashiri hi ni Kokoro yakeori
Source: Kenneth Rexroth's translations, Women Poets of Japan (1982), p. 15
The Mask and Mirror (1994), The Dark Night of The Soul
Context: Upon a darkened night the flame of love was burning in my breast
And by a lantern bright I fled my house while all in quiet rest.
Shrouded by the night and by the secret stair I quickly fled.
The veil concealed my eyes while all within lay quiet as the dead.
“Just as camphor is consumed by the flames of fire, so also, mind must be consumed by soul-fire.”
4
The Chidakasha Gita (1927)
Source: Kenneth Rexroth's translations, One Hundred More Poems from the Japanese (1976), p. 34
You Are My Life
Invincible (2001)
“When you have been burned by fire once, you don't leap into the flames again.”
Source: Between the Lines
"Written at Mauve Garden: Pine Wind Terrace" (tr. Y. N. Chang and Lewis C. Walmsley), in Sunflower Splendor: Three Thousand Years of Chinese Poetry, eds. Wu-chi Liu and Irving Yucheng Lo (1975), p. 477; also in The Luminous Landscape: Chinese Art and Poetry, ed. Richard Lewis (1981), p. 57.
“The flames of the heart consumed me, and the mind
Is but a foolish wind.”
Green Song & Other Poems (1944), Heart and Mind
