A Japanese miscellany - University of Oregon

106 Japanese Miscellany
Deru tsuki to
Iri-hi no ai ya —
Aka-tombo.
In the time between the setting of the sun and the rising
of the moon — red dragon-flies.
Yu-kage ya,
Nagare ni hitasu
Tombo no o
The dragon-fly at dusk dips her tail into the running
stream.
IV
The foregoing compositions are by old authors
mostly : few
modern hokku on the subject have
the same naive quality of picturesqueness. The
older poets seem to have watched the ways of
the dragon-fly with a patience and a freshness of
curiosity impossible to this busier generation.
They made verses about all its habits and pecu-
liarities, — even about such matters as the queer
propensity of the creature to return many times
in succession to any spot once chosen for a perch.
Sometimes they praised the beauty of its wings,
!