Left
ゆふざれもさらにまたれずあさぼらけおきゆくみちのつゆとけぬべし
| yūzare mo sara ni matarezu asaborake okiyuku michi no tsuyu to kenubeshi | For eventide, Again, I cannot wait, but At the dawning Rise and go—my path filled With lasting dew, it seems. |
24
Right
あはぬよはわびてもねにきあかつきのわかれのみちはまどはれぞする
| awanu yo wa wabite mo ne ni ki akatsuki no wakare no michi wa madoware zo suru | Nights we fail to meet Are desolate, but when I have come and slept with you The dawn’s Parting path Leaves me lost! |
25
Round Six
Left
ふるゆきに山のほそみちうづもれてまれにとひこし人もかよはず
| furu yuki ni yama no hosomichi uzumorete mare ni toikoshi hito mo kayowazu | With the falling snow The mountain’s narrow pathways Are buried; But rarely did he visit and now Cannot make his way at all. |
Cell of Fragrant Cloud
53
Right
あしたつるみわのひばらにゆきふかみみやぎひくをのかよひぢもなし
| ashi tatsuru miwa no hibara ni yuki fukami miyagi hiku o no kayoiji mo nashi | Reeds stand tall in Miwa, where the cypress groves Are deep with snow; To cut sacred timber, the woodsman Has no path to tread at all. |
Cell of Compassionate Light
54
The Left’s poem, in terms of style and diction, entirely grasps the way someone might feel. What a sense of grief! The Right’s poem is composition that fairly drips and delves into playfulness, but in so doing lacks feeling. Truly, the former poem has superlative qualities, resembling a black dragon’s pearl![i] Thus, the Left must win.
The Left does seem to have been composed but simply stated. It possesses a calm elegance. The Right seems to have been created after a great deal of thought. This poem shows effort and the former such calm that I wish to declare them a tie. This may enrage the poets, but the ignorant may give the appearance of being knowledgeable, as they say. I wonder who composed these…
[i] Riju 驪珠 as an abbreviation of riryū no tama 驪龍の珠 (‘black dragon’s pearl’). Mototoshi uses this analogy deliberately as black dragons were associated with winter. The pearl, which they were often depicted as holding or being located in their throat, was a symbol of the dragon’s spiritual development and a marker of its immortality. This is thus an effusive statement of praise for Shōchō’s poem.
Round Three
Left
おぼつかないづれいづちのみちならむしをりも見えずふれるしらゆき
| obotsukana izure izuchi no michi naramu shiori mo miezu fureru shirayuki | How strange! Which is which Path, I wonder? Even the laden branches go unseen In the falling snow, so white. |
Retired from the World
47
Right
雪ふかみとなりのさともうづもれてけぶりのみこそしるしなりけれ
| yuki fukami tonari no sato mo uzumorete keburi nomi koso shirushi narikere | So deep the snow, that The estate next door Is buried; Trails of smoke are the only Sign it’s there! |
Senior Assistant Minister Past Lecturer
48
The poem of the Left’s ‘even the laden branches go unseen’ and what follows is both poetic and a familiar usage. As for the Right’s poem, how can ‘the estate next door be buried’ unless it’s the only place that snow is falling and nowhere else? Thus, I feel that the snow falling to conceal the broken branches has more feeling to it.
The Left’s ‘which path’ gives me the impression that there are many of them. This sense of multiplicity is something I can imagine—which is a good thing—and, I think, see me using myself. ‘Laden branches’ are something which occur on peaks deep in the mountains. It might be a bit remiss of me, but I wonder whether I can imagine snow drifting so high on a mountain peak?
As for the Right’s poem, we use ‘next door’ when there’s a fence of some sort between one estate and another, don’t we? As such, saying that the smoke is the sign is rather vague. Even if there’s been a quite extraordinary snowfall, there would be something other to notice as well as the smoke, so this is an error, isn’t it. It would be acceptable to refer to smoke if the estate were further away.
Sent in a letter when one of the lads who was an acolyte of his departed for a distant province, accompanying his father.
わかれぢの草葉をわけむ旅ごろもたつよりかねてぬるるそでかな
| wakaredi no kusaba wo wakemu tabigoromo tatu yori kanete nururu sode kana | Along the path that parts us, Forging through the leafy grasses In your traveller’s garb Since you have left, and before How soaked are my sleeves! |
Dharma Master Yūzen
Round Two
Left (Win)
秋霧のたえまにみゆる紅葉ばやたちのこしたる錦なるらん
| akigiri no taema ni miyuru momijiba ya tachinokoshitaru nishiki naruran | The autumn mists have Gaps revealing Scarlet leaves— Remaining offcuts of Brocade, perhaps? |
Lord Tsunemori
75
Right
もみぢちる立田の山はえぞこえぬ錦をふまむ道をしらねば
| momiji chiru tatsuta no yama wa e zo koenu nishiki o fumamu michi o shiraneba | Scattered with scarlet leaves Tatsuta Mountain I cannot cross, for To tread upon a brocade Path I know not how… |
Lord Yorimasa
76
The Right is a poem on fallen leaves and blossom—something about which many people have composed in the recent past and modern times, too. The Left sounds as if it truly depicts things as they are. Its overall construction is lovely, too, so it should win.
Original
ふるさとのかすがののべのくさもきもはるにふたたびあふことしかな
| furusato no kasuga no nobe no kusa mo ki mo haru ni futatabi au kotoshi kana | At the ancient capital Upon Kasuga’s plain, Grasses and trees, both, Springtime have twice Met this year! [1] |
Mitsune
34
Left (Win)
はるながらまたはるにあふかすがのにおひぬくさきはねたくやあるらん
| haru nagara mata haru ni au kasugano ni oinu kusaki wa netaku ya aruran | ‘Tis spring, but That springtime once more has come To Kasuga Plain, Won’t the grasses and trees growing there Be envied, indeed? |
35
Right
ゆきかへるみちのやどりかかすがののくさきにはなのたびかさぬらむ
| yukikaeru michi no yadori ka kasugano no kusaki ni hana no tabikasanuramu | Is it that arriving and departing, The lodging on spring’s path lies On Kasuga Plain, so On the grasses and trees, blossom Appears time and time again? |
36
[1] This poem occurs in Mitsune-shū (322) with the same headnote as for poem (22), above. It was also included in Shinsenzaishū (X: 980), with the headnote, ‘Composed in place of the Governor of Yamato in Engi 21, on the day when the Kyōgoku Lady of the Bedchamber visited the shrine at Kasuga.’
Left
あまのがはわたりてのちぞたなばたのふかきこころもおもひしるらむ
| ama no gawa watarite nochi zo tanabata no fukaki kokoro mo omoishiruramu | After the River of Heaven She has crossed, The Weaver Maid The depths of her heart’s Feelings seems to know too well. |
17
Right (Win)
あふよなきたなばたなればいまはとてかへるくもぢにまどはれしかな
| au yo naki tanabata nareba ima wa tote kaeru kumoji ni madowareshi kana | Were there no night’s meeting For the Weaver Maid, then Now, Upon her homeward path among the clouds Would she have wandered, lost! |
18
Topic unknown.
ゆらのとをわたるふな人かぢをたえ行へもしらぬ恋のみちかな
| yura no to o wataru funabito kaji o tae yukue mo shiranu koi no michi kana | In the Yura strait A ferryman a’crossing Rudderless I know not whither bound am I On this path of love! |
Sone no Yoshitada
