Her Majesty’s reply:
呼ぶとしも聲は聞えで花薄しのびに招く袖も見ゆめり
| yobu to simo kowe Fa kikoede Fana susuki sinobi ni maneku sode mo miyumeri |
A calling Voice I cannot hear; yet The silvered grass fronds Secretly beckoning Sleeves do seem to me. |
Monthly Archives: December 2015
Ise Shū 28
Her Majesty, the Empress, had such a limitlessly refined nature, that there was no one in the world who was her equal. Ise’s chamber had a most beautiful garden planted before them and, in autumn, when she had returned to her dwelling for a while, Her Majesty wrote, ‘Why have you not returned yet? It seems that you will be so late in coming that the pine crickets before your chamber will have ceased to sing and the flowers will, no doubt, be past their best.’ Ise replied:
松虫も鳴きやみぬなる秋の野に誰よぶとてか花見にも來む
| matu musi mo nakiyaminu naru aki no no ni tare yobu tote ka Fanami ni mo komu |
The pining crickets Have ceased to sing In the autumn fields; Who calls from there, I wonder, Will she come to view the flowers… |
Ise Shū 27
Ise Shū 26
The Prince she had borne when she had served the Emperor, passed away in his fifth year, and all the world felt it source of extraordinary grief. Although she grieved, she knew there was nothing that could be done about it and felt it was not enough to want to live no longer, so she filled her days and nights with love; then from the man who had nicknamed her ‘Seen it!’ came:
思ふより言ふはおろかになりぬればたとへて言はむ言の葉ぞなき
| omoFu yori iFu Fa oroka ni narinureba tatoFete iFamu koto no Fa zo naki |
More than my thoughts: Speech cannot express them So – By comparison speaking Words is lacking, indeed! |
She no longer had such feelings, so she sent no reply.
A sea
Ise Shū 25
Ise’s response:
海とのみ團居の中はなりぬめり其ながらあらぬ君が見ゆれば
| umi to nomi madowi no naka Fa narinumeri so nagara aranu kimi ga miyureba |
A sea and nothing more The centre of our circle Has become, it seems; So unlike it once was? The sight of our lord. |
Never-ending dew
Ninna-ji
The Ninna-ji 仁和寺 was the temple where Uda had his lodgings after he took the tonsure. Uda ordered its construction in 888, following a prior request from Emperor Kōkō 光孝天皇 (830-887; r. 884-887), and then designated it as his retreat after its completion. It subsequently took in a number of monastic member of the Imperial family. While a temple bearing the same name still stands on the original site in Kyoto’s Ukyō-ward, and is famous as a spring cherry blossom location, the current buildings are 16-17th century reconstructions.
He trod a mountain path
GSS XV: 1097
When the Priestly Retired Emperor first took the tonsure, he trod a mountain path and the Empress first of all, and all his other senior and junior consorts gathered in the same palace; some three years later the Emperor returned, and at the end of a meal they had shared there, talking of long ago things
言の葉に絶えせぬ露はおくらんやむかしおぼゆる團居したれば
| koto no Fa ni taesenu tuyu Fa okuran ya mukasi oboyuru madowi sitareba |
Upon the leaves that are our words Never-ending dew Falls, does it not? When as in times long gone We sit around together… |