All My Walking, by Santōka Taneda

I want to plug a book. I read a lot of books, but rarely does one affect me enough that I want to recommend it.

The book is called For All My Walking. It's a collection of poetry by Santōka Taneda, translated from Japanese by Burton Watson.

Taneka was a college dropout, failed businessman, divorced husband, mediocre Zen monk and alcoholic who finally decided to walk the roads of Japan, going from town to town begging for alms and recording his thoughts in his diary and as haiku poetry. He lived from 1882 to 1940. He died at age 57.

He became one of Japan's most celebrated haiku poets.

You can find out more about Taneda in this biographical sketch by Nonin Chowaney of the Nebraska Zen Center. It covers a lot of the reasons Taneda's poetry has so much appeal for me.