87 



III 



T APANESE poems on semi are usually very 

 brief ; and my collection chiefly consists of 

 bokku, compositions of seventeen sylla- 

 bles. Most of these bokku relate to the sound 

 made by the se'mi, or, rather, to the sensation 

 which the sound produced within the poet's 

 mind. The names attached to the following 

 examples are nearly all names of old-time poets, 

 not the real names, of course, but the go, or 

 literary names by which artists and men of 

 letters are usually known. 



Yokoi Yayu, a Japanese poet of the eighteenth 

 century, celebrated as a composer of bokku, has 

 left us this naive record of the feelings with 

 which he heard the chirruping of cicadae in 

 summer and in autumn: 



" In the sultry period, feeling oppressed by the 

 greatness of the heat, I made this verse : 



" Se'mi atsushi 

 Matsu kirabaya to 

 (Dmou-made*. 



[The chirruping of the se'mi aggravates the heat until I 

 wish to cut down the pine-tree on which it sings.] 



