a man for all seasons: 1910

1816

.我国は猿も祈とうをしたりけり
waga kuni wa saru mo kitô wo shitari keri

in my province
even trained monkeys
offer prayers!

1819

.名月の御名代かや白うさぎ
meigetsu no gyomei dai ka ya shiro usagi

are you the harvest moon's
representative?
white rabbit

Instead of seeing, as some Westerners do, a man on the moon, Japanese people perceive the outline of a rabbit. Shinji Ogawa notes that gyomei dai or gomyô dai means a "representative" in this context. The rabbit is representing the moon on earth, Issa quips.

1802

.湯の里とよび初る日やむら燕
yu no sato to yobi-somuru hi ya mura tsubame

today they're flying
in the bathhouse town...
swallow swarm

Mura in this haiku is not "village"; it refers to something that is bunched together with other things of the same class, i.e., in this case, a flock; Kogo dai jiten (Shogakukan 1983) 1602.

1810

.此門の霞むたそくや隅田の鶴
kono kado no kasumu tasoku ya sumida no tsuru

at the gate
so many in the mist!
Sumida River cranes

year unknown

.木がらしや塒に迷ふ夕烏
kogarashi ya negura ni mayou yû-garasu

winter wind--
he can't find his roost
the evening crow

Hiroshi Kobori comments on the word, kogarashi ("winter wind"). In early Japanese poetry, this refers to the wind that blows through trees, breaking branches and turning the leaves brown. By Issa's time it means "a dry windy day during the late autumn-deep winter season."
It is classified as a winter season word.

1824

.神の猿蚤見てくれる小春哉
kami no saru nomi mite kureru ko haru kana

sacred monkeys
pick each other's fleas...
a spring day in winter

Literally, the monkeys are "the god's monkeys" (kami no saru), implying that the scene is taking place on a sacred mountain,
probably near a Shinto shrine.

"Little spring" (ko haru) refers to mild, clear weather in the
Eleventh and Twelfth Months.

all haiku by issa, and translations, and commentary from here