A summer poem, when she presented a hundred poem sequence.

かへりこぬむかしをいまとおもひねの夢の枕ににほふ橘

kaerikonu mukashi o ima to omoine no yume no makura ni niou tachibana

Never to return is The past, but in the present It fills my sleepy thoughts A’dreaming on my pillow With the scent of orange blossom.[1]

Princess Shokushi

---

[1] An allusive variation on: Sent to a lady with whom he had once been intimate, after some years had passed. いにしへのしづのをだまき繰りかへし昔を今になすよしもがな inishie no / shizu no odamaki / kurikaeshi / mukashi o ima ni / nasu yoshi mogana ‘In times long gone / Thread upon a bobbin was / Wound back— / Just so, the present into the past / I wish we could make!’ It seems, though, that the lady thought nothing of it. (Ise monogatari 65)