Left (Win).
変れただ別るる道の野辺の露命に向ふ物も思はじ
| kaware tada wakaruru michi no nobe no tsuyu inochi ni mukau mono mo omowaji |
O, change Upon our parting! The path Through the dew dropped fields – How like life: I would not think such thoughts! |
713
Right.
別れ路のありける物を逢坂の關を何しに急ぎ越えけん
| wakareji no arikeru mono o ōsaka no seki o nani shi ni isogikoeken |
The path after parting Is such a thing, so Why to Meeting Hill’s Barrier Gate do we Rush to pass in haste? |
714
The Gentlemen of the Right state: the diction in the Left’s poem fails to link. The Gentlemen of the Left state: what novelty there is in the Right’s poem!
Shunzei’s judgement: in the Left’s poem it does not appear to me that the diction of the initial section links poorly. ‘How like life’ (inochi ni mukau) does, indeed, appear in the Man’yōshū and other works, but it does not seem that desirable. As for the Right, while it seems that the appearance of Meeting Hill is well understood, saying ‘why to the barrier gate’ (seki o nani shi ni) is inferior to ‘how like life’.
When he went down to Michinoku Province, he sent this back to the capital from the barrier at Meeting Hill.
われひとり急ぐと思ひし東路に垣根の梅はさきだちにけり
| ware Fitori isogu to omoFisi adumadi ni kakine no mume Fa sakidatinikeri |
I, alone, Was hurried, or so I thought, Upon this eastland road; The plum trees by the fence Have bloomed already. |
Tachibana no Norimitsu
Once Sei Shônagon was chatting to Major Councillor [Fujiwara no] Yukinari when, saying the palace was sealed because of a taboo, he made as if to leave hurriedly the following morning; she said he had been urged to leave by the cocks’ crowing, so he replied, ‘Cocks only crow in the middle of the night at Hangu Pass, don’t they?’ and got up and left; she composed this to say they were at Meeting Hill Barrier.
夜をこめて鳥の空音ははかるともよに逢坂の關はゆるさじ
| yo wo komete tori no sora ne Fa Fakaru tomo yo ni aFusaka no seki Fa yurusazi |
In the depths of night Cocks’ crows Cause confusion, yet In the dark on Meeting Hill The barrier won’t let you through! |
Sei Shōnagon
清少納言
Composed on the waters of Hashiri Spring, on the road home from Ishiyama.
逢坂の關とは聞けど走井の水をばえこそとゞめざりけれ
| aFusaka no seki to Fa kikedo Fasiriwi no midu wo ba e koso todomezarikere |
Of Meeting Hill’s Barrier, I had heard, yet Hashiri Spring’s Waters it does damn all To stop! |
The Horikawa Grand Minister [Fujiwara no Kanemichi]