Though the exact reason for her action is unknown, according to Santōka's diaries his mother had finally reached the point where she could no longer live with her husband's philandering.

[2] By that time his father Takejirō was in such dire financial straits that he could barely afford to pay his son's tuition.

In his diaries, Santōka confesses that the sight of his mother's corpse being raised from her watery grave had forever tarnished his relationship with women.

The name is originally one of the list of natchin (納音), i.e., labels given to a person's year of birth according to the Chinese sexegenary cycle, which are used for divination.

[8] Seisensui (1884–1976) could be regarded as the originator of the free-form haiku movement, though fellow writers Masaoka Shiki and Kawahigashi Hekigoto also deserve recognition.

[9] Writers following the early-twentieth century movement known as free-form or free-style haiku (shinkeikō 新傾向, lit.

'new trend') composed haiku lacking both the traditional 5-7-5 syllabic rule and the requisite seasonal word (kigo).

Santōka began regularly contributing poetry to Seisensui's haiku magazine Sōun (層雲, Layered Clouds).

As an exponent of free style haiku, Santōka is often ranked alongside Ozaki Hōsai (1885–1926), a fellow student of Seisensui.

They both suffered from the ill effects of their drinking habits and were similar in their reliance on Seisensui and other patrons of the arts for aid and support.

Santōka proved no more reliable at working a steady job than he had at going to college, and though he did secure a permanent position as a librarian in 1920, by 1922 he was again unemployed due to another "nervous breakdown".

He stayed in Tokyo long enough to experience the Great Kantō earthquake, after which he was apparently jailed as a suspect Communist.

The Zen life seemed to work for Santōka: by the next year at the age of forty-two he was ordained in the Sōtō sect.

In 1926, after a year spent as caretaker of Mitori Kannon-dō temple in Kumamoto, Santōka set out on the first of many walking trips.

During his trips, Santōka wore his priest's robe and a large bamboo hat known as a kasa to keep off the sun.

is all I say and, looking like a drowned rat, I walk on, Finally can't go on any longer and take shelter in the lee of a roadside warehouse.

[20] In 1936, he again began to walk, intent on following the trail of the famous haiku poet Bashō (1644–1694) as described in Oku no Hosomichi (The Narrow Road to the Interior).

In 1938, Gochūan became unfit for habitation, and after another walking trip, Santōka settled down at a small temple near Matsuyama City.