Chinese Poem on Fishing and Zen

Ōsen Keisan was a monk of the Rinzai Zen sect and a prominent figure in the literary salon culture of the five important Zen temple complexes of Kyoto known as the Gozan. He was an aide and close confidant of the eighth Ashikaga shogun, Yoshimasa (1436–1490), and advised him on both foreign affairs and literature. This calligraphy––brushed in a flamboyant yet fully controlled combination of semicursive and cursive scripts on gorgeous orange-red-dyed paper––records Ōsen’s own composition. His Chinese-style seven-character quatrain evokes fishing as an allegory for the quest for enlightenment:

屋似蘆花浅水舟　釣無眞贋只天遊
禅河敎海掣鯨手　春雨爲絲状月鈎
贋釣斎詩　英叔美少請

My hut resembles a shallow-water skiff amid the reeds and flowers.
When fishing, "truth" and "deception" do not apply, so we can just freely enjoy nature.
From the river of Zen, into the ocean of the Buddhist Law, I try to reel in a whale.
Using fine spring rain as a fishing line with the hook of the crescent moon.

—Trans. John T. Carpenter