While he has loved the Way of Poetry since his previous lives, Archbishop Eien knows nothing at all about poems’ merits and ills. It being hard to decline his urgings to act as judge and finding myself completely unable to do so, I have judged without concern for how I may be mocked and disparaged for it. Should there be no alternate opinions raised, truly, I would be overjoyed.
Round Seven
Left
かすがやまちえにさかゆるさかきばはよろづよまでのきみがためか
| kasugayama chie ni sakayuru sakakiba wa yorozuyo made no kimi ga tame ka | Upon Kasuga Mountain A thousand branches grow, Leafy, on the sacred tree— Until ten thousand ages pass Will they ward my Lord! |
Lady Kazusa
69
Right
君がよはいふかぎりなしみよしののこがねがみねにみよをまつまで
| kimi ga yo wa iu kagiri nashi miyoshino no kogane ga mine ni miyo o matsu made | My Lord’s reign— Words cannot describe: ‘til fair Yoshino’s Golden peak’s Age one must await! |
Lady Shikibu
70
The poem of the Left seems poetic to an extraordinarily outlandish degree! The poem of the Right’s ‘‘til fair Yoshino’s / Golden peak’s / Age one must await!’ has a sufficient conception of felicitation. Thus, these tie.
That the Left is addressed to Mount Kasuga is highly admirable. Is the Right’s ‘golden peak’ a reference to Mount Mitake? It’s very difficult to say anything profound here. Arbitrarily, I would make this a tie—the quality of the poems makes that seem right.
Round Six
Left (Win)
うれしさはおほつのはまにたつなみのかずもしられぬきみがみよかな
| ureshisa wa ōtsu no hama ni tatsu nami no kazu mo shirarenu kimi ga miyo kana | My joy is Great, as upon Ōtsu Beach Break waves In numbers quite unknown, Such is my Lord’s reign most fair! |
Cell of Fragrant Cloud
67
Right
かすがやまみねのしらがしよろづよをきみにといへばかみもいさめず
| kasugayama mine no shiragashi yorozuyo o kimi ni to ieba kami mo isamezu | Kasuga Mountain has White-barked evergreen oaks upon its peak: ‘Ten thousand generations For my Lord!’—should I say that, The God will surely not refuse! |
Cell of Compassionate Light
68
The poem of the Left’s ‘Great, as upon Ōtsu Beach’ and what follows is something that sounds grievously prosaic. With that said, there are many parts of the poem which are not. What is the poem of the Right’s ‘White-barked evergreen oaks on its peak / Ten thousand generations’ linked with in the remainder of the poem? I wonder what it’s composed about… The Left doesn’t contain any errors, so I still say it wins.
The Left’s poem, as I have said in an earlier round, appears to lack smoothness. Is the poem of the Right’s ‘white-barked evergreen oaks’ a long-standing expression? I can’t seem to recall a prior precedent. ‘The God will surely not refuse’ is vague, too. Is it asking the deity’s favour for the speaker? While I am somewhat hesitant, given my appallingly constricted knowledge, I will, fearfully, say that this is inferior.
Round Five
Left
君がよはながゐのうらのはまかぜにたつしらなみのかずもしられず
| kimi ga yo wa nagai no ura no hamakaze ni tatsu shiranami no kazu mo shirarezu | My Lord’s reign: At Nagai Bay The beach breezes Rouse the whitecaps In number entirely unknown. |
Controller’s Graduate
65
Right
きみがよをまつちのやまのこまつばらちよのけしきを見るぞうれしき
| kimi ga yo o matsuchi no yama no komatsubara chiyo no keshiki o miru zo ureshiki | My Lord’s reign Awaiting upon Matsuchi Mountain The pine seedling groves The sight for a thousand ages Joyfully will see! |
Kerin’in Graduate
66
It’s impossible to decide on a winner or loser between the Left and the Right here in terms of conception, diction and overall style. To put it in general terms, I must make this round a further tie.
Neither Left nor Right is remarkable, but nor do they have any faults to mention. I’d make this round a tie.
Round Four
Left
うちむれていはねにねざすこまつばのきぎのちとせはきみぞかぞへむ
| uchimurete iwane ni nezasu komatsuba no kigi no chitose wa kimi zo kazoemu | Crowding At the crags’ foot, roots stretching, The dwarf pines’ needles with The trees’ thousand years— My Lord may count them all! |
Cell of the Fragrant Elephant
63
Right (Win)
たとふべきものこそなけれ君がよははまのまさごもかずなからめや
| tatoubeki mono koso nakere kimi ga yo wa hama no masago mo kazu nakarame ya | A suitable metaphor Is there none, at all! My Lord’s reign: Even the fair sands on the shore Would not exceed its number… |
Cell of Everlasting Truth
64
Both of the Left poem’s expressions, ‘crowding’ and ‘dwarf pines’ needles’, seem to sound awkward. ‘Crowding’ is used of cranes, while it would have been preferable to say ‘the needles of the dwarf pines’. The poem of the Right is not especially charming, but it is in a familiar style, so I feel that ‘the fair sands’ number’ is superior.
I feel that ‘crowding’ is better applied to human beings. Perhaps there’s a conception here of looking down on each and every one? This is a mistake, isn’t it? In addition, what is ‘dwarf pines’ needles’? Maybe the poet is trying to say ‘the needles of the dwarf pines’? Is there a prior poem as precedent? It’s a piece of awkward-sounding diction! The Right’s poem appears straightforward, but without errors.
Round Three
Left[i]
君が代は神にぞいのる住之江の松の千年をゆづれとおもへば
| kimi ga yo wa kami ni zo inoru suminoe no matsu no chitose o yuzure to omoeba | My Lord’s reign: To the gods I pray, that Suminoe’s Pines their thousand years Pass on—that is my hope… |
Retired from the World
61a
きみがへむやちよのかずはあめにますとよをかひめの神やしるらん
| kimi ga hemu yachiyo no kazu wa ame ni masu toyo’okahime no kami ya shiruran | That my Lord will endure The number of eight thousand ages— Residing in the heavens, The Goddess of the Eternal Hills, The deity, knows well, no doubt! |
Retired from the World
61b
Right (Win)
君がよはつきじとぞおもふ春の日の御笠の山にささむかぎりは
| kimi ga yo wa tsukiji to zo omou haru no hi no mikasa no yama ni sasamu kagiri wa | My Lord’s reign Will never fade, I feel! While in spring the sun Upon Mikasa Mountain Shines down… |
Senior Assistant Minister Past Lecturer
62
Both Left and Right have neither strengths nor weakness in their diction and sense, but I feel that ‘While in spring the sun / Upon Mikasa Mountain / Shines down’ is a bit more dependable at present than ‘Suminoe’s / Pines their thousand years’.
It is certainly not the case that there are no dubious elements about the Left’s poem. As ‘eight thousand ages’ is a definite number, what is it that the Goddess of the Eternal Hills is expected to know? If this is something in the deity’s hands, then it should be, ‘does not even know the number’. I’m sure the Goddess herself would ask what she’s expected to know. The Right seems stronger.
[i] There are different poems by Eien this round in different versions of the text of the contest. As can be inferred from the judgements, Mototoshi saw the first poem and Toshiyori the second. This strongly suggests that Mototoshi’s judgements were circulated before the text of the contest was submitted to Toshiyori, and Eien revised his poem this round as a result (Kubota et al. 2018, 308).
Round Two
Left (Win)
君がよはあまのいはとをいづるひのいくめぐりてふかずもしられず
| kimi ga yo wa ama no iwato o izuru hi no iku meguri chō kazu mo shirarezu | My Lord’s reign: Since from the stone door in the heavens Emerged the sun, ‘How many circuits has she made?’, they ask— A number quite unknown. |
Lord Saburō
59
Right
みかさやまふもとのさとはあめのしたふるにおもひもあらじとぞ思ふ
| mikasayama fumoto no sato wa ame no shita furu ni omoi mo araji to zo omou | At Mikasa Moutain’s Foot, in a hamlet ‘neath the heavens Passing time—painful thoughts There I’d have not a one, I feel! |
Ushigimi
60
The Left’s poem goes beyond the general flow of diction, containing mystery and depth. I have to say it is truly superior. While the Right’s poem has no faults to mention, it has yet to emerge from prosaic expression. Thus, the Left wins.
The ‘stone door in the heavens’ is that which the supreme sun-deity Amaterasu stood before and then entered. But when we’re talking about dawn breaking at the end of night, we say ‘gates of heaven’. Which of these two was did the poet have in mind, I wonder? If he was thinking of dawn breaking, then the usage is erroneous, but even if he did mean ‘stone door of the heavens’, then do we use this about the circuits of the sun? This is vague. In addition, the final ‘they ask’ is difficult to pronounce. As for the Right’s poem, ‘‘neath the heavens’ lacks emotion. The dual use of ‘thoughts’ and ‘feels’, as I have already remarked, is not an error, but does grate on the ears a bit.
Felicitations
Round One
Left
みどりなるまつかげひたすいけ水にちよのすみかとみゆるやどかな
| midori naru matsukage hitasu ikemizu ni chiyo no sumika to miyuru yado kana | Evergreen The pine tree’s shapes sink Into the pond waters— A residence for a thousand ages Does that dwelling seem! |
Lord Dainagon
57
Right (Win)
ちとせともいろにはいでていはし水ながれむほどは君がよなれば
| chitose to mo iro ni wa idete iwashimizu nagaremu hodo wa kimi ga yo nareba | For a thousand years or more Does its hue emerge— Spring waters from the rocks Might flow as long as My Lord’s reign will be, so… |
Lord Chūnagon
58
What on earth might be the colour of the Left poem’s ‘pine tree’s shapes sink’ and the Right poem’s ‘thousand years’ hue’? When one talks about ‘hue’ that means ‘scarlet’ and, in addition, it’s used of blossoms or autumn leaves. I have yet to see wisteria colouring the water in numerous private collections. The two poems are about the same, but the Right is marred by a series of faults.
The Left’s ‘shapes sink’ is extremely vague. ‘Sink’ means to submerge an object in water. One could certainly compose about a pine tree’s branches sinking, but how can we accept ‘shapes sink’ to mean an object’s reflection from beneath the water in the absence of a poem as precedent? The end is extremely, charming, though.
The poem of the Right doesn’t have anything special about it. It’s a pedestrian affair which doesn’t seem to show much evidence of thought. How are we to distinguish between a poem which is hackneyed but lacking any faults and one which is vague?
Round Seven
Left (Win)
しらゆきのふりしきぬればかづらきやくめのいはばしそことしられず
| shirayuki no furishikinureba kazuraki ya kume no iwabashi soko to shirarezu | Snow, so white Has fallen, scattering Upon Kazuraki, that The broken stone bridge of Kume Is there no one knows at all. |
Lady Kazusa
55
Right
まきもくのあなしひばらもうづもれてかかるみゆきもふればふりけり
| makimoku no anashi hibara no uzumorete kakaru miyuki mo fureba furikeri | In Makimoku Anashi’s cypress groves Are buried, Such a fair fall of snow Has there been. |
Lady Shikibu
56
The Left has neither positives nor negatives. Up to ‘the broken stone bridge of Kume’ shows some imagination. It feels overly remote. The Right’s ‘Anshi’s cypress groves’ is something I’ve not encountered in a poem before. The standard usage is ‘cypress groves of Anashi’. Compared to this, I feel the expression is more unsatisfactory. ‘Such a fair fall of snow / Has there been’ is surprising, too, and not something I’m accustomed to seeing, so the Left seems a bit better at present.
The Left does not appear to have any significant faults. ‘That’ in ‘upon Kazuraki, that’ sounds a bit distant. If you’re talking about a bridge, you should say that you can see across it, shouldn’t you. It is a bridge which it’s impossible to cross, so that’s difficult to say. The Right’s expression ‘Anashi’s cypress groves’ is pedestrian so I would have preferred it omitted. In addition, the final ‘has there been’ feels commonplace. A win for the Left, perhaps.
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.