Moon Through the Leaves, from the series Twenty-eight Views of the Moon

A cliffside tree reaches across the face of a full moon. Autumn maple leaves fall, their slow downward drift contrasting with the plunging waterfall. Both are amplified by the long vertical format of the print. In the space at the right is a poem from Wakan rōeishū, a classical anthology of Japanese and Chinese poems from the eleventh century that would have been familiar to the highly literate Edo populace.


It is not unbearable to see maple leaves fall, Scattering on the moss-covered ground.
It is unbearable to feel the wind grow chilly,
And see the whole sky darkening.

—Translated by Yoko Woodson