KANAE
111Japanese quotation 名言

花は盛りに、月は隈なきをのみ見るものかは

Hana wa sakari ni, tsuki wa kumanaki o nomi miru mono ka wa

“Should we look at blossoms only in full bloom, at the moon only when it is clear?”

Attributed to Yoshida Kenkō · Kamakura

The meaning

Beauty is not only in perfection: the promising bud, the falling flower, the veiled moon have their own grace. Loving the unfinished too widens the world infinitely.

At the origin

A famous passage from the "Tsurezuregusa" (14th century) by Yoshida Kenkō.

The characters

  1. hanablossoms
  2. watopic marker
  3. 盛り sakarifull bloom
  4. 隈なき
  5. のみ
  6. 見る
  7. もの
  8. かは

The complete word-by-word reading, in KANAE.

ParticleMarks the topic: what the sentence is about — “as for…”.

In practice

Find the beauty of something imperfect, beginning or ending.

Themes

In the collections · Yohaku, Haru

Similar proverbs

Related expressions

See also