Matsuo Basho Quotes

Quotes about:

• Every day is a journey, and the journey itself is home.

  Matsuo Basho

  Inspirational, Nature, Healing

  Matsuo Basho (2014). “Basho's Narrow Road: Spring and Autumn Passages”, p.31, Stone Bridge Press, Inc.

  128 Copy quote

• Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise. Seek what they sought.

  Matsuo Basho

  Inspirational, Life, Positive

  146 Copy quote

• Learn how to listen as things speak for themselves.

  Matsuo Basho

  Speak

  Matsuo Basho (2006). “Narrow Road to the Interior”, p.17, Shambhala Publications

  83 Copy quote

• Real poetry, is to lead a beautiful life. To live poetry is better than to write it.

  Matsuo Basho

  Beautiful, Real, Writing

  135 Copy quote

• No matter where your interest lies, you will not be able to accomplish anything unless you bring your deepest devotion to it.

  Matsuo Basho

  Lying, Passion, Matter

  119 Copy quote

• Make the universe your companion, always bearing in mind the true nature of things-mountains and rivers, trees and grasses, and humanity-and enjoy the falling blossoms and the scattering leaves.

  Matsuo Basho

  Fall, Rivers, Tree

  88 Copy quote

• Before enlightenment, chopping wood and carrying water. After enlightenment, chopping wood and carrying water.

  Matsuo Basho

  Water, Enlightenment, Woods

  110 Copy quote

• Learn the rules, and then forget them.

  Matsuo Basho

  Forget

  15 Copy quote

• The desire to break the silence with constant human noise is, I believe, precisely an avoidance of the sacred terror of that divine encounter.

  Matsuo Basho

  Believe, Silence, Desire

  59 Copy quote

• Sitting quietly, doing nothing, Spring comes, and the grass grows, by itself.

  Matsuo Basho

  Inspirational, Positive, Spring

  106 Copy quote

• A flute with no holes is not a flute.

  Matsuo Basho

  Flutes, Holes

  78 Copy quote

• There is nothing you can see that is not a flower; there is nothing you can think that is not the moon.

  Matsuo Basho

  Flower, Moon, Thinking

  105 Copy quote

• Go to the pine if you want to learn about the pine, or to the bamboo if you want to learn about the bamboo. And in doing so, you must leave your subjective preoccupation with yourself. Otherwise you impose yourself on the object and you do not learn.

  Matsuo Basho

  Bamboo, Want, Preoccupation

  55 Copy quote

• The moon and sun are travelers through eternity. Even the years wander on. Whether drifting through life on a boat or climbing toward old age leading a horse, each day is a journey, and the journey itself is home.

  Matsuo Basho

  Horse, Home, Moon

  92 Copy quote

• Come, butterfly It's late- We've miles to go together.

  Matsuo Basho

  Butterfly, Together, Miles

  Matsuo Basho (2015). “Lips too Chilled”, p.43, Penguin UK

  76 Copy quote

• What is important is to keep our mind high in the world of true understanding, and returning to the world of our daily experience to seek therein the truth of beauty. No matter what we may be doing at a given moment, we must not forget that is has a bearing upon our everlasting self which is poetry.

  Matsuo Basho

  Self, Understanding, Mind

  9 Copy quote

• Old pond, frog jumps in - plop.

  Matsuo Basho

  Ponds, Frogs

  Matsuo Basho, “The Old Pond”

  18 Copy quote

• Every moment of life is the last, every poem is a death poem.

  Matsuo Basho

  Lasts, Life Is, Moments

  26 Copy quote

• Nothing in the cry of cicadas suggests they are about to die

  Matsuo Basho

  Cicadas, Cry, Dies

  Matsuo Basho (2006). “Narrow Road to the Interior”, p.132, Shambhala Publications

  33 Copy quote

• Come, see the true flowers of this pained world.

  Matsuo Basho

  Flower, World

  13 Copy quote

• The oak tree:
  not interested
  in cherry blossoms.

  Matsuo Basho

  Spring, Tree, Cherry Blossom

  Matsuo Basho, “The Oak Tree”

  47 Copy quote

• Operating superficially, the mind is random in its activity and stale in its insights and images. However, with practice and experience the mind is freed from the skull, and the fresh and new can appear as though for the first time. It

  Matsuo Basho

  Time, Practice, Skulls

  Matsuo Basho (2003). “A Zen Wave: Basho's Haiku and Zen”, p.18, Counterpoint Press

  102 Copy quote

• In this poor body, composed of one hundred bones and nine openings, is something called spirit, a flimsy curtain swept this way and that by the slightest breeze. It is spirit, such as it is, which led me to poetry, at first little more than a pastime, then the full business of my life. There have been times when my spirit, so dejected, almost gave up the quest, other times when it was proud, triumphant. So it has been from the very start, never finding peace with itself, always doubting the worth of what it makes.

  Matsuo Basho

  Writing, Poetry, Doubt

  69 Copy quote

• Traveler's heart. Never settled long in one place. Like a portable fire.

  Matsuo Basho

  Travel, Heart, Fire

  6 Copy quote

• The journey itself is my home.

  Matsuo Basho

  Travel, Home, Adventure

  18 Copy quote

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