Round Twelve
Left (Tie)
あらし吹くまくずが原に鳴く鹿は恨みてのみや妻をこふらん
| arashi fuku makuzu ga hara ni naku shika wa uramite nomi ya tsuma o kouran | Storm winds blow Across the arrowroot upon the plain Where bells a stag— Might it be with bitterness, alone, that He yearns for a mate? |
Shun’e
47
Right
山里は妻こひかぬる鹿の音にさもあらぬ我もねられざりけり
| yamazato wa tsuma koikanuru shika no ne ni sa mo aranu ware mo nerarezarikeri | In a mountain retreat, Filled with too much yearning for his mate A stag bells out— ‘Tis not true of me, yet Still I cannot sleep. |
Lay Priest Master
48
The Left’s stag’s bell seeming to despise the arrowroot field and the Right’s inability to sleep on hearing a stag belling at a mountain retreat are both evocative of lonely sadness and neither sounds at all inferior to the other in the depths of the emotion they convey, so I find myself quite unable to distinguish between them.
