Round Six

Left (Win)

山姫はもみぢのにしきおりてけりたちなやつしそ嶺の朝霧

yamahime wa momiji no nishiki oritekeri tachi na yatsushi so mine no asagiri

The mountain’s princess, Of scarlet leaves brocade Has woven; In your rising don’t despoil it, O, morning mists upon the peak!

Lord Kinshige
83

Right

しぐれには紅葉の色ぞまさりける又かきくもる空はいとはじ

shigure ni wa momiji no iro zo masarikeri mata kakikumoru sora wa itowaji

A shower makes The scarlet leaves’ hues Most fine; So, the swiftly clouding Sky I could not dislike.

Lord Masahira

84

The Right sounds as if the poet has just come to the revelation that, even though a showery sky is charming, can one possibly dislike it, given that it improves the hues of the scarlet leaves. The Left isn’t bad, but it does have two identical sounds ending lines, and this has been called the same-sounding rhyme fault, I believe. With that being said, in the Tentoku Poetry Match, there were some poems with this feature which were criticized, and some which were not, so I wonder if this is not something to particularly worry about. In this poem it doesn’t sound like a defect and, taking this together with the fact that the Right’s poem is poor, the Left should win.