SOURCE: "The Old Pond," in A Zen Wave: Basho's Haiku and Zen, John Weatherhill, Inc., 1978, pp. 25-29.

In the following essay, Aitken analyzes a Buddhist haiku poem by Matsuo Basho.

The old pond;
 A frog jumps in—
 The sound of the water.

Furu ike ya
 kawazu tobikomu
 mizu no oto

Old pond!
 frog jumps in
 water of sound

The form Ya is a cutting word that separates and yet joins the expressions before and after. It is punctuation that marks a transition—a particle of anticipation.

Though there is a pause in meaning at the end of the first segment, the next two parts have no pause between them. In the original, the words of the second and third parts build steadily to the final word oto. This has penetrating impact—"the frog jumps in water's sound." Haiku poets commonly play with their base of three parts, running...