Page:The Spirit of Japanese Poetry (Noguchi).djvu/108

104

The breezes fan, The leaves of the acacia trees Turn on Dreamily.

The dark-red shadow-spots of the sun Swing; Alas, of a sudden, My thought disordered.”

He is a builder of a brick house who sets his materials with care; he is a curio-shop keeper who arranges his bric-a-brac with no small taste. He is not a free bird who sings to a star; but he is a caged nightingale who sings beautifully. His understanding of what it is to be a poet is thorough; and he can be that quite easily. However, his poetical atmosphere is rather close and shut up; his mind is too systematic; he has too good a head to be a great poet. What is symbolism if not “the affirmation of your own temperament in other things, the spinning of a strange thread which will bind you and the other phenomena together”? Kanbara is that symbolist; he looks upon everything with his own special personality. We have no symbols in the strict literary meaning; it seems to me that he has a great chance before him; and if he can work out his own symbolism, he may create a special cult for the future generation to follow. But we are rather doubtful of the nature of his faith; I have some reason to think that his