Haiku: Classic Japanese Short Poems

Haiku features 80 classic poems from four poets – Matsuo Bashō, Yosa Buson, Kobayashi Issa and Masaoka Shiki – which range across more than 200 years of Japanese poetry. Each poem is presented in Japanese script, along with romanised Japanese (romaji), a new English translation and an illustration echoing the poem's theme.



Haiku – seventeen-syllable poems that evoke worlds despite their brevity – have captivated Japanese readers since the seventeenth century. Today the form is practiced wor...