Tag Archives: mountain trees

Love VIII: 10

Left (Win)
うかりける我み山木の契かな連なる枝もありとこそ聞け

ukarikeru
wa ga mi yamagi no
chigiri kana
tsuranaru eda mo
ari to koso kike
In despair
Am I: hidden among the mountain trees
Is my love;
Though once branches lay atop each other
I did hear…

Lord Suetsune
1039

Right
涙には憂き深山木も朽ちぬべし沖つ小嶋のひさきならねど

namida ni wa
uki fukayamagi mo
kuchinubeshi
oki tsu kojima no
hisaki naranedo
Among my tears,
Drift, despairing, trees from the mountain deeps,
Rotting all away, though
On islets in the offing
On bush-covered beaches, they are not…

Lord Tsune’ie
1040

Both Left and Right state: we find no faults.

In judgement: both Left and Right use the image of ‘trees from the mountain deeps’ (fukayamagi), and neither is superior, or inferior, to the other in this, but I would have to say that the Left’s ‘though once branches lay atop each other I did hear…’ (tsuranaru eda mo ari to koso kike) is somewhat better than the Right’s ‘on bush-covered beaches, they are not…’ (hisaki naranedo).