• quinacridone@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    7 months ago

    I rather like this one…

    wearily she waves

    the white flag of surrender

    cobwebbed butterfly

    —Tracy Davidson from here

    Pawprints fade, empty

    Silence fills the empty space

    Love lives on, always

    From here

    I sometimes feel that the classic haiku are let down by some translations, and the fact there are Japanese words that don’t translate across very well or at all.

    I have a soft spot for this one

    The old pond,

    A frog jumps in:

    Plop!

    Translated by Alan Watts from here

    It’s interesting to see how each translation differs, and tries to put into English something that is probably untranslatable…also…

    pond

    frog

    plop!

    Translated by James Kirkup

    ‘The sound of water’ ‘kerplunk’ ‘splashing the water’ ‘leap, splash’ ‘water note’ …just don’t capture it for me

    Do you know any that are decent?