Left (Win)
うちむれてなれぬる人の心をば野邊の霞もへだてやはせん
| uchimurete narenuru hito no kokoro o ba nobe no kasumi mo hedate ya wa sen |
To a gathering Of friendly folk With hearts all in accord, The haze across the fields Will be no hindrance, at all. |
65
Right.
梓弓春の日ぐらし引つれているさの原にまとゐをぞする
| azusayumi haru no higurashi hikitsurete irusa no hara ni matoi o zo suru |
A catalpa bow: Spring, all day long, Drawn out Upon Irusa Plain Let’s music make! |
66
The Right have nothing special to say about the Left’s poem, but the Left grumble that the Right’s seems to be more on the theme of bows, than ‘field pleasures’, and add that they ‘fail to understand’ the reason why Irusa Plain has been singled out, among all the plains in Japan.
Shunzei, however, says that this criticism is ‘completely unjustified’ and that the Right’s poem is ‘strictly in accord’ with the theme of ‘field pleasures’. He goes on to praise the use of association in the poem, with azusa yumi, ‘catalpa bow’, associating with haru (‘spring’, but also ‘draw (a bow)’), hiki (‘pull’), iru (‘shoot (a bow)’) and mato (‘target’). Moving on to the Left’s poem, he says that the final stanzas seem ‘particularly good’, and that it would ‘do a disservice’ to the composition of poetry if he awarded a victory based on association alone, so the Left’s poem must be the winner.