Pine (matsu)

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Pine (matsu)

***** Location: Japan
***** Season: Non-seasonal Topic
***** Category: Plant

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Explanation

The Pine itself is not connected to any special season, but there are many other words used as kigo, using the pine as a part of it. There also various types of PINE in Japan.

First read this essay by Linda Inoki about the pine in Japan.


©
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/images/photos2005/fe20050106lia.jpg

Matsu (Pine) By LINDA INOKI

From high in the sky,
The snow making its way down
Following the pine.

By Seishi Yamaguchi, quoted in "The Essence of Modern Haiku" by Takashi Kodaira and Alfred H. Marks (Mangajin)

With the onset of winter, many Japanese gardens start to feature strange and ethereal "sculptures" made of string: These are the yukitsuri, or "snow lines." Although their purpose is to protect pine trees from heavy snow, they are so airy and attractive that they seem to invite it to fall from the skies! This practical idea has been turned into a piece of garden artistry, and even in regions where snow rarely falls, gardeners cannot resist adding these graceful touches to the winter scene.

I sketched this small pine tree with its high snow ropes in a Tokyo garden. It is a goyomatsu ( Pinus pentaphylla; Japanese white pine), which you can identify by its silvery bark and pine needles growing in groups of five. White pines are slow-growing and are popular for training into bonsai or specimen trees in the garden. Being tough, long-lived and evergreen, pine trees are important symbols of endurance and eternity in Oriental culture. With their year-round foliage, they also bridge the seasons of winter and spring, and although we live in a material world it is good to see that many people still decorate their gateways with the traditional branches of pine to greet the New Year.
The Japan Times: Jan. 6, 2005
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/getarticle.pl5?fe20050106li.htm

Yukitsuri, trees in bondage.
By Alice Gordenker, Japan Times Feb. 2007

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"Three friends of Winter", Pine, Bamboo and Plum
Shoo-chiku-bai 松竹梅

They are an auspicious assembly used since olden times in Chinese art, later in Japanese art too. The symbolic meaning of the Pine Tree is "Long Life".
Pine trees show abundand green even in the fiercest of winter and hardly dry out, so they have been a symbol of long life in China since old times. They also represent friendship and constancy during times of advertsity. As symbol of good luck and agelessness this tree has stood in veneration and together with the bamboo and plum tree as become an expression of celebration and joy.

Sometimes the pine tree symbolizes one of the Chinese gods of happiness and long life, Shou Hsing.

In Japan, we have the couple of Joo (尉) and hers is Uba (媼)
"The Pine of Sumi-no-e" (住吉の松) and the Takasago Legend

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New Year Kigo

Gate Decoration with Pine, kadomatsu 門松
placed one each at the gate or entrance of a home. Their size reflects the richness of the owner. They are put out on December to welcome the Deities and burnt on January 6 or 14 (matsu osame 松納め) .
..... Pines by the corners, kado no matsu 門の松


http://homepage3.nifty.com/plantsandjapan/img270.gif


pine decorations, matsu kazari 松飾り
..... kazari matsu 飾り松
bamboo decorations, kazari take

Click HERE to have a look at some photos !

..... Pulling Pine Seedlings (komatsu hiki)

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SPRING KIGO

young green, wakamidori 若緑 is a general term for the pines when they start growing.
also called
green of the pine, matsu no midori　松の緑,
first green, hatsu midori 初緑
green starts to stand up, midori tatsu 緑立つ

and finally

松の芯　matsu no shin, center of the pine growing, pine candles:
kigo for late spring

matsu no SHIN can also be interpreted as the strong will of the pine (human) to keep going in adverse situations, so this expression is well loved in Japanese poetry.


© Gabi Greve

松の花 まつのはな matsu no hana, pine flowers



http://haikusouann.web.infoseek.co.jp/page_thumb167.html


松花粉 まつかふん matsu kafun, pine pollen
This is a growing problem in Japan these days.

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松囃子　matsubayashi, music and dance performance
http://ww7.tiki.ne.jp/~agari/matubayasi-syasinn.html
http://www.city.fukuoka.jp/contents/7d14c213111/7d14c21311110.htm

お松明 おたいまつ o-taimatsu pine torch [used in the ceremony] for O-Mizu Tori ceremony

Read more about this festival here:
http://www.mahoroba.ne.jp/~vrk-nara/omizutori/shunie-e.html

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SUMMER KIGO

Pine needles falling down, matsu ochiba 松落ち葉

松漁 かつお katsuo bonito [kanji literally "pine fish"]

松蝉 [まつぜみ] matsuzemi, pine-tree cicada

松葉牡丹 まつばぼたん matsubabotan portulaca / rose moss [literally "pine-needle peony"; Portulaca grandiflora] 日照草 ひでりぐさ hiderigusa sun plant [another name for portulaca in both Japanese and English]

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AUTUMN KIGO

松葉　matsuba pine needles

松手入 まつていれ matsu teire, pruning pines [literally "pine maintenance"]

新松子 しんちぢり shinchijiri, new pinecone(s)
青松毬（青松笠） あおまつかさ aomatsukasa, green pinecone(s)

松茸 まつたけ matsutake pine mushroom(s) [Armillaria edodes] VERY expensive.
松茸飯　matsutake meshi, rice with matsutake mushrooms, a very expensive delicacy

松虫 matsumushi, pine bug
松虫草 matsumushi-soo pine, bug grass


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Worldwide use

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Things found on the way

Matsu are a favorite for Bonsai too. Look at some nice pictures.
http://homepage3.nifty.com/plantsandjapan/page033.html

MATSU 待つ　can also mean: to wait for somebody.
Here is a story about Daruma and the Pine, waiting...
http://www.amie.or.jp/daruma/Matsu-2.html

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HAIKU

僧朝顔幾死返る法の松

Monks and morning glories;
How many have died and returned!
The Dharma pine.

Matsuo Basho

... this verse may be in the form of hokku, but it is not really hokku. It is a religious verse, and when we try to "preach" religion in hokku, the result inevitably fails. Also, this verse requires a kind of prologue just to be understood, which compounds the problem because it cannot "stand on its own feet."

Bashô saw a great and very old pine tree at a temple. It reminded him of the story of the Chinese Daoist Zhuangzi (Chuang-tzu) about a tree that survived the years because its wood was useless. That set Bashô off on a train of thought about how many monks had come and gone, like morning glories that bloom in the dawn and die in the evening, and yet the great pine, protected on the temple grounds by the "Dharma," had survived to very old age.
Writing about such things has its place, but it does not fit hokku.

© David Coomler


Hoo no Matsu, the Pine of the (Buddhist) Law.

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門松やおもへば一夜三十年
kadomatsu ya omoeba ichiya sanjuunen

pine decorations -
thinking about it, one night
feels like thirty years

Bashoo
(tr. Gabi Greve)

芭蕉発句集

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matsu tatete sora honobono to akuru kado

putting up the pines,
dawn sky breaks,
at the gates

Natsume Sooseki

Read more Haiku here !
University of Virginia Saijiki

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... ... ... ... ... Pine Candles



pine candles
on a sandy beach -
power of life

© Gabi Greve Beachflowers

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pine candles -
day by day
they lengthen

© Linda Papanicolaou

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浜道や砂から松の若みどり　
hamamichi ya suna kara matsu no waka midori

beach raod -
from the sand emerging
young green

Choo Mu 蝶 夢（died 1795）

This haiku captures the same mood as I experienced in Yonago in 2004. This kigo usually discribes a scene of light and warmth and hope.

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The following haiku where kindly suggested by Etsuko Yanagibori.
cherrypoetryclub

ame no ka ni tachimasarikeri matsu no shin

fragrance of rain -
growing up eagerly,
the pine candles

Watanabe Suiha (1882 - 1946)

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Musashino no tori kuru matsu no shin mugen

birds of Musashino plain
coming to the pine candles -
infinity

Hasegawa Kanajo (1887 ~ 1969)

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赤松は芯　黒松は花 こぼしけり

Akamatsu wa shin Kuromatsu wa hana koboshikeri

Red pine candles
Black pine flowers
so abundantly

Fujita Akegarasu 藤田あけ烏
http://www.d2.dion.ne.jp/~t_katou/goroku0.html


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Related words

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