A Pond, a Poet, and Three Pests.

By Buddhism Now on 24 June 2026 • ( 0 )

Written by: Caroline Adderson, Illustrated by: Lauren Tamaki.

This lovely book is about Haiku.

Haiku is the Japanese form of poetry in which an ordinary moment in nature is expressed in a few simple words. Each poem reflects a deeper truth, or idea, than what is being described.

This story imagines how one haiku, “Old Pond” by Matsuo Basho, came to be. Many translations of “Old Pond” exist.

One evening, the famous Japanese poet Bashō arrived at a pond. He sat down, closed his eyes, and began to muse on a haiku.

A golden carp recognised him as it glided past. Hoping to be immortalised in verse, it danced across the surface of the pond, fluttering the golden extravagance of its tail. Next, a water lily opened and wafted its delicate scent towards him. Then a mosquito, a self-proclaimed ‘big fan,’ buzzed in the poet’s ear.

Yet neither the sight, the scent, nor the sound managed to disturb Bashō’s serene concentration — until a frog, out for nothing more than a dip, inadvertently became the inspiration for his now-famous haiku, ‘The Old Pond.’

In the end, it is not the golden carp’s graceful dance, the water lily’s sweet scent, or the mosquito’s buzz that capture the poet’s attention. Instead, it is the frog, simply going about its swim, that catches his focus.

The book beautifully captures this truth: thoughts and sensations arise like visitors at the pond — colourful, noisy, or fragrant — and then, just as naturally, they fade away. Bashō does not struggle to shape them into a poem; he simply sits and watches them come and go, serene and present. In its own playful way, this delightful book invites us to do the same.