Tag Archives: asahi

Entō ōn’uta’awase 5

Round 5

Left (Win)

朝日影まだ出でやらぬ足引の山はかすみの色ぞうつろふ

asahi kage
mada ideyaranu
ashihiki no
yama wa kasumi no
iro zo utsurou
The morning sunlight
Has yet to fall upon
The leg-wearying
Mountains, yet the haze’s
Hues are shifting.

Takasuke, Gentleman-in-Waiting
9

Right

山姫のかすみのそでも紅に光そへたる朝日影かな

yamahime no
kasumi no sode mo
kurenai ni
hikari soetaru
asahi kage kana
The mountain princess has
Her sleeves of haze turned
Scarlet
Draped with light by
The morning sunshine!

Shimotsuke
10

The Left’s poem has no faults worth pointing out; the poem of the Right’s ‘morning sunlight draping scarlet light across the sleeves of haze’ is overly gorgeous, I think, while the Left seems perfectly beautiful, so it should win.

Entō ōn’uta’awase 01

Morning Haze

Round One

Left (Tie)

しほがまの浦のひがたのあけぼのに霞にのこる浮島の松

shiogama no
ura no higata no
akebono ni
kasumi ni nokoru
ukishima no matsu
At Shiogama
Bay uponn the tide-sands
With the dawn
Lingering in the haze are
The pines on Ukishima.

A Court Lady
1

Right

春の夜の朧月夜の名残とや出づる朝日も猶かすむらん

haru no yo no
oborozukiyo no
nagori to ya
izuru asahi mo
nao kasumuran
A spring night’s
Misty moon—
Does it leave a keepsake in
The rising sun
Yet seeming hazed?

Ietaka, Junior Second Rank
2

Generally, for the judging of poetry, one chooses people who have been permitted to take this Way, who can distinguish the good from the bad among the reeds of Naniwa Bay and plumb the depths and shallows of the sea. And now I do so, when I have passed through the mulberry gate, but have no time for the Three Tiers and Nine Levels of Rebirth, or even for dipping into Tomi stream, and have but distantly heard the waves of Waka Bay these past sixteen springtimes, though I was wont, in the ancient blossom-filled capital, to string together a mere thirty-one syllables from time to time.

Though now I do not divert myself with this Way, Ietaka of the Junior Second Rank is a long-standing officer of the Poetry Office and a compiler of the New Ancient and Modern collection. His dewdrop life of almost eighty has begun to vanish now with the wind on Adashi Plain, but I thought to converse with him and just this once, debate over his deeply considered words and compare the configuration of his works. Thus, through the jewelled missives we exchanged, I had him assemble poems on ten topics by those from whom I am not estranged and write them down in pairs.

The numbers of such folk were not great, and among them are those who have only recently begun to have an interest in the learning the Six Principles. That the words of Shinobu’s sacred groves would be scattered by the wind and encounter hindrances here and there, I had thought, but in the end, I paid no heed to folk’s criticisms in order to avoid barriers on the path to rebirth. Among these, I match my own foolish compositions with those of Ietaka—it may not be an appropriate thing to do for the Way, but given our association, as ancient as Furu in Isonokami, I have done this out of special consideration for him.

Nevertheless, long ago I perused the poems of the Eight Anthologies from time to time, and they certainly have some spectacle about them, but yet many are now unclear. Indeed, among the poems of folk of modern times, over the past ten years I have not heard of even a single poem, for all that they are composed the same way, that it is possible to view as outstanding. Not only that, but as I approach my sixties and descend into my dotage, the signs of my own foolishness become increasingly apparent.

The first poem of the Left often wins, yet this has nothing remarkable about it. The Right’s poem, on the morning following a misty moonlit night, has a true link with the morning haze, and the sequencing of its diction and configuration are particularly charming. Nevertheless, the Left’s poem in the first round is in accordance with the matter, and I am thus not able to pick a winner or loser.

MYS XVII: 4003

A poem with two envoys, composed in respectful response to Tachiyama.

朝日さし そがひに見ゆる 神ながら 御名に帯ばせる 白雲の 千重を押し別け 天そそり 高き立山 冬夏と 別くこともなく 白栲に 雪は降り置きて 古ゆ あり来にければ こごしかも 岩の神さび たまきはる 幾代経にけむ 立ちて居て 見れども異し 峰高み 谷を深みと 落ちたぎつ 清き河内に 朝さらず 霧立ちわたり 夕されば 雲居たなびき 雲居なす 心もしのに 立つ霧の 思ひ過ぐさず 行く水の 音もさやけく 万代に 言ひ継ぎゆかむ 川し絶えずは

asapi sasi
sogapi ni miyuru
kamu nagara
mina ni obasesu
sirakumo no
tipe wo osiwake
ama sosori
takaki tatiyama
puyu natu to
waku koto mo naku
sirotape ni
yuki pa puri okite
inisipe yu
arikinikereba
kogosikamo
ipa no kamusabi
tama kiparu
ikuyo penikemu
tatiwite
miredomo ayasi
minedakami
tani wo pukami to
otitagitu
kiyoki ka puti ni
asa sarazu
kiri tati watari
yupu sareba
kumowi tanabiki
kumowi nasu
kokoro mo sino ni
tatu kiri no
omopi sugusazu
yuku midu no
woto mo sayakeku
yoroduyo ni
ipitugi yukamu
kapa si taezu wa
The morning sun shines
At my back,and
Divine
Your great name links:
Clouds of white
In a thousand layers, you pierce, and
Tower into the heavens,
Tall Tachiyama!
In winter and, in summer both
Indistinguishably are you
Clad in mulberry white
Fallen drifts of snow;
Since ancient days
Ever has been your estate,
Fastened round with
Crags divine;
‘til all souls end
Have countless ages passed!
Standing here,
I see you, yet am awed by
Your lofty peak and
Valley’s deep, where
Plunge seething cataracts of
Waters pure to pools where
Morning never leaves –
Mists rise and roll across, and
When the evening comes
Clouds trail in and
Cover all,
Even, with sadness, my heart, so
The rising mists
Never leave my thoughts, and of
Your running waters’
Clear, pure sound
Through ten thousand ages
Will I ever tell
Unending as a river’s flow…

Ōtomo no Ikenushi
大伴池主