miyakobe ni yume ni mo yukamu tayori araba utsu no yamakaze fuki mo tsuteyo
If towards the capital, Even to her dreams would you go, and Be my messenger, O, Utsu Mountain breeze, Blow, and tell her…[i]
599
[i] See: While at Utsu Mountain in Suruga, he thought of someone he had been meeting and sent this to the capital. するがなるうつの山邊のうつゝにも夢にも人にあはぬなりけり suruga naru / utsu no yamabe no / utsutsu ni mo / yume ni mo hito ni / awanu narikeri ‘In Suruga / At the Utsu mountains / In truth and / In my dreams she / Is nowhere to be seen…’ Ariwara no Narihira (Shinkokinshū X: 904)
kusamakura tabi ni shi areba imo ni koi samuru ma o nami yume sae miezu
A pillow of grass I have on my travels, so Yearning for my darling I lie awake, not even Glimpsing her within a dream.[i]
565
[i] See: 家有者 笥尓盛飯乎 草枕 旅尓之有者 椎之葉尓盛 ie ni areba/ ke ni moru ii o / kusamakura / tabi ni shi areba / shii no ha ni moru ‘When I am at home / The pots are full of rice, but / Pillowed on the grass / On this journey now / Only the chinquapin leaves are plentiful…’ Prince Arima (Man’yōshū II: 142)
Composed on the conception of love at a famous location
とよ国の菊のながはま夢にだにまだみぬ人に恋ひやわたらん
toyokuni no kiku no nagahama yume ni dani mada minu hito ni koi ya wataran
In the land of Toyo, in the western isle, Lies the long beach of Kiku, I hear— Even in my dreams Have I yet to see her, but Will my love for her go on and on?
yume nomi mo kayoedo aranu arikiji ka utsutsu ni ikade miru yoshi mogana
Simply in my dreams Do I go back and forth, yet have no Lover’s path to walk, so In the waking world, somehow, I wish I had a way to see her!
21
This poem is an acrostic with ‘bellflower’ (kichikau) contained in arikiji ka utsutsu. Old Japanese was written without indicating voicing, so chi and ji would have been identical at the time.
nezameshite uki yo o omoi awasureba madoromu yume ni kawarazarikeri
When I awake, with This cruel world my thoughts Occupying, The dream that filled my doze Differed not at all…
Hyōenokami 121
Right (Win)
すみのえのうきにおひたるしをれあしをなみひきたてよかみのめぐみに
suminoe no uki ni oitaru shiore’ashi o nami hikitateyo kami no megumi ni
In Suminoe’s Muddy waters grows, Languishing, a reed: O, waves, lift it upright! To receive the deity’s blessing…
Lord Michichika 122
The poem of the Left appears to have an elegant sequence, saying, ‘This cruel world my thoughts / Occupying’, but the speaker does not appear to be particularly thinking of themselves—they are simply reflecting on the transience of this world and that’s how it is. The poem of the Right begins with ‘In Suminoe’ and then has ‘Muddy waters grows’, linking the particular shore with the content. The Right should win.
