Soseki, Musō: Sun at Midnight: Poems and Letters

Translated by W.S. Merwin & Soiku Shigematsu. Copper Canyon Press (paperback, 2013) Publisher Marketing: Long out of print, this reissue is the first translation into English of the work of Musō Soseki, the thirteenth-century Zen roshi and founder of the rock garden. A gorgeous introduction by co-translator W.S. Merwin sets the stage for 130 poems and six letters to the Emperor that combine delicacy and lightness with penetrating plainness. Essential for poets, gardeners, and students of Zen. Toki-no-Ge (Satori Poem) "Year after yearI dug in the earthlooking for the blue of heavenonly to feelthe pile of dirtchoking meuntil once in the dead of nightI tripped on a broken brickand kicked it into the airand saw that without a thoughtI had smashed the bonesof the empty sky" Born ten years after Dante Alighieri, Musō Soseki was the most famous Zen monk of his time, and is considered the father of the rock garden. Musō spent much of his early life practicing Zen in remote temples and her