Left
さりともと待べき程の情かは人頼めなる蛛のふるまゐ
| sari tomo to matsubeki hodo no nasake ka wa hito tanomenaru kumo no furumai |
However faint, I thought, Through all my waiting hours Were his feelings, He can be trusted, Says the spider’s spinning! |
Lord Ari’ie
1071
Right (Win)
はかなくぞさもあらましに待たれぬる頼めぬ宵の蜘蛛のふるまゐ
| hakanaku zo sa mo aramashi ni matarenuru tanomenu yoi no kumo no furumai |
Fleeting, but So be it, then, I thought, Awaiting; How unreliable is this night’s Spider’s spinning… |
Lord Takanobu
1072
Left and Right together: both poems are about spiders, and have no faults to mention.
In judgement: both poems seem elegant in their reference to ‘spider’s spinning’ (kumo no furumai). However, the Left’s central section recalls ‘Men are not trees or stone – they have feelings’ – while this is elegant diction in Chinese composition, it does not seem so in our own poetry. The Right’s ‘so be it then, I thought’ (sa mo aramashi) is fine, but ‘unreliable is this night’ (tanomenu yoi) sounds as if the night is already over. Princess Sotōri, too, has ‘must surely come tonight’ (kubeki yoi nari), but then appears to have ‘a certain sign’ (kanete shirushi mo). Still, this is surely describing a situation where one once had doubts, but feel that tonight is reliable. The Right is slightly superior.