A small street scene unfolds in three lines. The speaker watches two nuns walking on city pavement, their figures muffled and sombre, while behind them a group of girls is laughing. The image is simple but sharply drawn: in front, quiet, veiled women moving at a steady pace; behind, the bright, unguarded energy of youth.
The mood is observant and gently bittersweet. The speaker does not judge either group, but the contrast sets up a wordless tension between lives shaped by restraint and lives still full of ordinary freedom. The nuns seem apart from the city’s liveliness, and the laughing girls make that separation feel more pronounced. Because it is a hokku, much is left unsaid. We are given a fleeting moment, almost a snapshot, and asked to feel its quiet poignancy rather than have it explained.