Page:The Spirit of Japanese Poetry (Noguchi).djvu/22

18 or advancement of the Western poetry, not only spiritually, but also physically.

Japanese poetry, at least the old Japanese poetry, is different from Western poetry in the same way as silence is different from a voice, night from day; while avoiding the too close discussion of their relative merits, I can say that the latter always fails, naturally enough through being too active to properly value inaction, restfulness, or death; to speak shortly, the passive phase of Life and the World. It is fantastic to say that night and day, silence and voice, are all the same; let me admit that they are vastly different; it is their difference that makes them so interesting. The sensitiveness of our human nature makes us to be influenced by the night and silence, as well as by the day and voice; let me confess, however, that my suspicion of the Western poetic feeling dates from quite far back in the days of my old California life, when I was quite often laughed at for my aimless loitering under the moonbeams, and for my patient attention to the voice of the falling snow. One who lives, for instance, in Chicago or New York, can hardly know the real beauty of night and silence; it is my opinion that the Western character, particularly of Americans, would be sweetened, or at least toned down, if that part of the beauty of Nature might be emphasised. Oh, our Japanese life of dream and silence! The Japanese poetry