Japanese poetry

Death is a part of life. For as long as someone can live, they can die just as quickly. The reality of death has been portrayed through multiple mediums in various cultures but poetry seems to address it quite often. One poet: Kakinomoto Hitomaro, wrote about the life and death of his wife with frightening emotion. Hitomaro lived in Japan during the 8th century and “his elegy on his first wife is among the most touching poems in any language” (Barnstone 461). Although Hitomaro’s poem is…

Spring has arrived and so has the beginnings of a new school year, seeing the same faces just months ago, but everyone has somehow changed, even if only a little. I left my home this morning expecting nothing out of the usual, though I left earlier so I could take my time watching the cherry blossoms before the day began. As I was walking to school I forgot how beautiful the sakura were. I always hated walking up this ridiculous hill every day but, the rows of sakura made it a little easier to…

pilgrimage to the glorious palace of western literature when I started from ABC on, then read simple passages, later moved onto the beautiful essays and poetry and at last plunged into the classics by literary masters. Literary works are the inspirations from writers’ hearts. William Shakespeare and his plays, Francis Bacon and his philosophy, the poetry by William Wordsworth and Percy B. Shelley and the novels by Thomas Hardy and Mark Twain, they displayed…

Poetry is the abundance of life and the most incarnate of languages we use, expressing ourselves in a free and unrestricted form — this is what Ezra Pound means by “Make It New.” However, to create something fresh and unique, we need to look back into the past in order to know what rules and conventions to smash. Pound, T. S. Eliot, W. H. Auden along with many others are the pioneers of the Modernist era, innovating free verse, intellectual statements, and universal human significance. In this…

As stated by him “when I waste time for long periods, I paradoxically become more productive… I learned the guitar, played chess, wrote poetry and articles picked up a bit of Japanese, and learned a good deal of psychology among other things.” (Park). Park encourages adults to waste their time for the reason that they can be relaxing and beneficial to being productive. In a society where everything is invariably…

Research Note #2: “The Most Photographed Barn in America” Paragraph A: In this passage extracted from the novel White Noise, the author, Don Dellilo describes Jack and Murray’s visit to a tourist attraction known as the most photographed barn in America to exhibit the significance of perception in addition to humanity’s lack of awareness regarding reification. The first paragraph establishes the scene in a countryside with a “MOST PHOTOGRAPHED BARN IN AMERICA” sign, the presence of animals and…

The Lotus Sutra is renowned for the virtues it promotes. The Buddhist values found within the text have attracted followers for centuries. Furthermore, the cultural importance of the text can be seen in literature such as Royal Tyler’s Japanese Tales. One tale in particular, entitled “Incorrigible,” serves as a reference for the importance of a virtuous life. For the most part, “Incorrigible” follows the protagonist, poet and calligrapher Toshiyuki, on his journey through the afterlife and back.…

Shakespeare has been known for his strong writing skills and famous plays, poems and sonnets but behind those famous pieces is a short lived life of endeavors. Throughout his short and difficult life, Shakespeare wrote several collections of plays and poetry that focused on topics that involving the Elizabethan Age which influenced his writings, significantly changed how dramatic performances were received and has had a significant impact on today’s culture. Throughout many…

create prejudice. Fears of unfamiliar customs, differences in religion, and personal appearance issues created prejudices exhibited by the Japanese and the “barbarians”. The Japanese people called Americans the “foreign devils—the barbarians” (4). Fear was created in the Japanese because of their unfamiliarity with the American customs. In the book, the Japanese felt the Americans’ customs made them barbarians. They killed animals for shoes (26). Americans sat on benches rather than the floor…

Edmund Burke has said that Those who don't know history are doomed to repeat it. After Pearl Harbor in World War II, nearly 120,000 Japanese-Americans were stripped of their belongings, property, and businesses very similarly to the Jews being put into the ghetto by the Germans. Since the Iranian Hostage Situation, the 1993 World Trade Center and the 9/11 attacks, Muslim and Arabian Men, Women, and Children were against based on their religion and ethnicity. Some have even been arrested unfairly…