Pine seedlings on the Day of the Rat (子日小松)
Left
ねの日する松の葉ごとにかぞふれば猶ぞつきせぬきみが千とせは
ne no hi suru matsu no ha goto ni kazoureba nao zo tsukisenu kimi ga chitose wa On this Day of the Rat Every single pine needle I count, but Still the number would not exhaust The millennia of my Lord…
A Court Lady 1
Right
はるかなる君がよはひにくらべむと子日の松をけふは引くかな
harukanaru kimi ga yowai ni kurabemu to ne no hi no matsu o kyō wa hiku kana Distant is My Lord’s age: To what might it compare? Why The Rat Day pines that We pick today!
A Court Lady 2
Felicitations 賀
つきもせぬ君がよはひはいくちよとかぎれる竹の枝にやあるらん
tsuki mo senu kimi ga yowai wa iku chiyo to kagireru take no eda ni ya aruran Inexhaustible is My Lord’s age: How many thousand generations Limit it – a bamboo Branch might know!
Daishin
Felicitations 賀
我が君のよはひたけたるうれしさは大宮人の身にあまるらん
wa ga kimi no yowai taketaru ureshisa wa ōmiyabito no mi ni amaruran My Lord’s Age has reached such lofty heights – Could the joy of Courtiers all Be any greater?
Kanemasa
菊の水齢を延べずあらませばさとも荒さで今日あはましや
kiku no midu
yowaFi wo nobezu
aramaseba
sato mo arasade
keFu aFamasi ya
The chrysanthemums’ waters
Age do not extend –
If that were so, then
Would undisarrayed their estate be where
We would meet today?
15
Left.
昔我振分髪を見てしより戀に亂て老いぞしにける
mukashi ware
furiwakegami o
miteshi yori
koi ni midarete
oi zo shinikeru
Long ago, I,
Your hair, bunched on either side,
Did glimpse, and ever since
In a confusion of love
Have I grown old.
Lord Suetsune .
841
Right (Win).
色に染む心は同じ昔にて人のつらきに老を知るかな
iro ni somuru
kokoro wa onaji
mukashi nite
hito no turaki ni
oi o shiru kana
Being charmed by beauty
My heart is just the same
As long ago, but
How cruel for me now,
Feeling my age…
Lord Takanobu .
842
The Right state: ‘Your hair, bunched on either side’ (furiwakegami ) appears very abruptly. In addition, we wonder about the appropriateness of evoking youthful love. The Left state: the Right’s poem has no faults to indicate.
In judgement: the confusion evoked by ‘your hair, bunched on either side’ seems to have lasted rather too long. The Right’s poem sounds exactly as it should be. Thus, the Right should win.
'Simply moving and elegant'