Daikōtaigōgū daijin kiyosuke-ason ke uta’awase 29

Round Twenty-Nine

Left (Win)

君やあらぬ我が身やあらぬおぼつかなたのめしことのみなかはりぬる

kimi ya aranu
wa ga mi ya aranu
obotsukana
tanomeshi koto no
mina kawarinuru
Aren’t you who you once were?
Aren’t I who I was then?
How strange that
All we trusted in
Has changed.

Shun’e
57

Right

恋ひしなん命ぞをしきつれもなき人にしも身をかへんねたさに

koishinan
inochi zo oshiki
tsure mo naki
hito ni shimo mi o
kaen netasa ni
That I would die of love
Makes me regret my life!
But for that cruel
Girl should I
Exchange myself—exasperating!

Yorisuke

58

I feel the left is old-fashioned, isn’t it? And yet, it is not without feeling. The Right does not have a poor conception, but its diction is insufficient.

2 thoughts on “Daikōtaigōgū daijin kiyosuke-ason ke uta’awase 29”

  1. I don’t disagree with the judgement, except to say that for me it’s a much more clear win, despite being old-fashioned.

    1. Thank you for your comment! The judge, Michiyoshi, is deliberately echoing Ki no Tsurayuki’s criticism of Ariwara no Narihira, that his ‘diction is insufficient for his conception’, as Shun’e’s poem echoes Narihira’s famous KKS XV: 747.

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