Page:Poetry, a magazine of verse, Volume 7 (October 1915-March 1916).djvu/126

POETRY: made a furore in the American press. I exclaimed "What! You say it is poetry? How is it postible?" It appeared to me to be a cry from the socialist platform rather than a poem; I hope I do not offend the author if I say that it was the American journalist whose mind of curiosity always turns, to use a Japanese expression, to making billows rise from the ground Before Edwin Markham there was Whittier, who sent out editorial volleys under the guise of poetry; it is not too much to say, I dare think, that An American Anthology, by Mr. Stedman, would look certainly better if it were reduced to one hundred pages from its eight hundred; we are bewildered to see so many poet-journalists perfectly jammed in the pages. One cannot act contrary to education; we are more or less the creation of tradition and circumstance. It was the strength of the old Western poets, particularly Americans, that they preached, theorized, and moralized, besides singing in their own days; but when I see that our Japanese poetry was never troubled by Buddhism or Confucianism [as such], I am glad here to venture that the Western poet would be better off by departing from Christianity, social reform and what not

I deem it one of the literary fortunes, a happy happening but not an achievement, that till quite recently our Japanese poetry was never annoyed, fatigued, tormented by criticism What I am thankful for is that it has never degenerated into mere literature; when the Western poetry is in the hand, so to say, of men of letters, the greatest danger will he found in the fact that they are often the prey of publication; it is true that the Western poets, minor or major, or what not, have had always the thought of printing from early date till today I have seen so many poets who only live between the covers and die when the ink fades away.

I have quoted these passages because I think the impression made upon the mind of a Japanese by our poetry assists us in forming our own conception of Japanese poetry.

Considering the importance of the oriental influence upon all western art of the last half century, an influence that is only now, curiously enough, beginning to make itself felt in