Left.
重ねずは朱の衣何ならじ身を暖めよ麻手小衾
| kasanezu wa ake no koromo nani naraji mi o atatameyo asade kobusuma |
With no garments piled with My vermillion robe, What good is it? Come, warm my flesh, O meagre hempen blanket! |
579
Right.
冴ゆる夜の寒さも今はあらじかし朱の衾の厚く見ゆれば
| sayuru yo no samusa mo ima wa araji kashi ake no fusuma no atsuku miyureba |
On this chill, clear night The cold now You feel not, I think, for With vermillion has your bedding Grown thicker, it seems! |
580
Both Left and Right say that the other’s poem is undesirable.
Shunzei’s judgement: The conception and diction [sugata kotoba] of the Left’s ‘come, warm my flesh’ (mi o atatameyo) and the Right’s ‘the cold now’ (samusa mo ima wa) have the Gentlemen of each team stated to be undesirable, but this is not sufficient criticism. Neither poem expresses enough. They are of the same quality.