SOURCE: An introduction to Spring & Asura: Poems of Kenji Miyazawa, translated by Hiroaki Sato, Chicago Review Press, 1973, pp. xv-xix.

In the following introduction to Miyazawa's collection of verse Spring and Asura, Watson notes the pervasive presence of Buddhist ideals—selflessness, compassion, and the oneness of the universe—in Miyazawa's life and poetry.

  Those who with a happy frame of mind
 Have sung the glory of the Buddha,
 Even with a very small sound,…
 Or have worshipped,
 Or have merely folded their hands,…
 Or have uttered one 'Praise be!'—
 All have reached the state of buddhahood.

So declares the Saddharmapundarika or Lotus of the Wonderful Law, one of the most important sutras or scriptures of Mahayana Buddhism. It is a text to which Kenji Miyazawa paid special reverence, and both his life and his poetry were dedicated to the active expression of its teachings.

Kenji Miyazawa was born...