The End of Summer
Left
なくこゑはするものからに身はむなしあなおぼつかなうつせみのよや
| naku koe wa suru mono kara ni mi wa munashi ana obotsukana utsusemi no yo ya | Their voices sing And yet Their flesh is empty— O, how strange is A cicada shell world! |
Tadamine
9
Right (Win)
ほととぎすをちかへりなけうなゐこがうちたれがみのさみだれのこゑ
| hototogisu ochikaeri nake unaiko ga uchitaregami no samidare no koe | A cuckoo Calls again and again; A child’s shoulder-brushing Hair dangling down: The song of a summer shower. |
Mitsune
10
The Beginning of Summer
Left
ふるさとはこだかけれどもきみならぬほととぎすにもうとまれにけり
| furusato wa kodakakeredomo kimi naranu hototogisu ni mo utomarenikeri | Around this ancient estate The trees grow high, yet Not by you alone, By the cuckoo, too Am I despised. |
Tadamine
7
Right (Win)
やまがつのかきほにさけるうのはなはたがしろたへのころもかけしぞ
| yamagatsu no kakiho ni sakeru u no hana wa ta ga shirotae no koromo kakeshi zo | Along the mountain man’s Lattice fence bloom Deutzia: Whose white mulberry Robes are hung there? |
Mitsune
8
Left
おしなべて五月のそらを見渡せば草葉も水もみどりなりけり
| oshinabete satsuki no sora o miwataseba kusaba mo mizu mo midori narikeri | When the entire Fifth Month sky I gaze across, Blades of grass and water, too, Are green. |
72[1]
Right
くるるかとみれば明けぬる夏の夜をあかずとや鳴く山郭公
| kururu ka to mireba akenuru natsu no yo o akazu to ya naku yamahototogisu | Did you think ’twas sunset? When a glance would show the breaking dawn Of this summer night- Unsated by your song, do you sing on, Cuckoo in the mountains? |
73[2]
[1] Shinchokusenshū III: 152/Kokin rokujō I: 89
[1] Kokinshū III: 157, attributed to Mibu no Tadamine/Shinsen man’yōshū 57/Kokin rokujō VI: 4437
Left
夏の日を天雲しばしかくさなむぬるほどもなく明くる夜にせん
| natsu no hi o amagumo shibashi kakusanamu nuru hodo mo naku akuru yo ni sen | The summer sun is Briefly by heaven’s clouds Concealed! No time to sleep in The bright night they’ve made! |
68
Right
郭公なきつる夏の山辺にはくつていださぬ人やすむらむ
| hototogisu nakitsuru natsu no yamabe ni wa kutsute idasanu hito ya sumuramu | A cuckoo Singing in summer On the mountainside: Does a man who will not reveal The price of shoes live there? |
69
Left
夏の日を暮らし侘びぬる蝉のまにわがなきそふるこゑはきこゆや[1]
| natsu no hi o kurashiwabinuru semi no ma ni wa ga nakisouru koe wa kikoyu ya | The summer sun They know not how to endure, So with the cicadas My sobbing Voice do you hear? |
59
Right
恨みつつとどむる人のなければや山時鳥うかれでてなく
| uramitsutsu todomuru hito no nakereba ya yama hototogisu ukaredete naku | How I constantly despise The one who’s staying here If he were gone, would The mountain cuckoo Have aimlessly left his home to sing? |
60
[1] The phrase semi no (‘the cicadas’) is missing from the text of the contest, but has been suggested by later scholarship.