Introduction
Honjo to Kameido. After oft-repeated calamities of flood, this move was a happy one. In June, his oldest daughter was married, and the following summer Sachio was a grandfather. In the spring of 1913, the family finally moved to new quarters at Kameido, leaving only his tea-arbor where he often returned to meditate. Both his prose and poetry at this period express a sense of great relief, and his mind seemed to reach out to another higher synthesis. But it was to be cut off suddenly. On July 30, at two in the morning, he suffered a cerebral hemorrhage and passed away at six o’clock that evening. On August 2, he was buried in the Fumoin Temple in Kameido.
Sachio’s writings were not collected in his life-time, but in 1920, his pupils gathered his work and published the Complete works of Sachio Ito. In 1931, his verse and essays on poetry were published in four volumes.
Soseki Natsume (1867–1916), the greatest modern novelist, once wrote to a friend:
“The truth is a man like Sachio cannot talk about poetics. Worshipping Shiki to the point of absurdity, he is composing silly poems for dear life.”
Soseki was not alone in that sentiment; Sachio
18 
