Showers at one’s lodgings on a journey

Round One

Left

しぐれするもみぢのにしきゆかしきにあけてをたたむふたむらのやま

shiguresuru momiji no nishiki yukashiki ni akete o tatamu futamura no yama

Under the showers The scarlet leaves’ brocade I long to see, so With the dawn let’s set forth To Mount Futamura!

Jakunen
51

Right (Win)

みやこにもおもひやすらむくさまくらうちしぐれたるよはのねざめを

miyako ni mo omoiyasuramu kusamakura uchishiguretaru yowa no nezame o

Even in the capital Might you think of me? On a grassy pillow With a shower Awoken at midnight…

Suke
52

The Left poem’s ‘With the dawn let’s set forth / To Mount Futamura’ sounds charming, but as we can see from Lord Kanesuke’s poem ‘Futami Bay / Let’s see with the dawn’, it is quite pedestrian. Then there is the expression ‘long to see’—this really isn’t appropriate diction for poetry. I will admit that it appears from time to time in imperial anthologies, and so it is certainly permissible depending upon the style of the poem, though. There’s also the term ‘long to know’—one really shouldn’t use diction in a poetry match which doesn’t express the poet’s true feelings. As for the Right’s poem, it’s also quite pedestrian to say that showers fall on one’s way on a journey, but don’t necessarily fall in the capital, but saying that folk there might think of you waking on your journey, well, why wouldn’t they do that? The conception of the poem is pleasant, and I make it the winner.