A poem from a poetry competition held by Her Majesty, the Empress, during the Kanpyō period.
さく花は千種ながらにあだなれど誰かは春を怨はてたる
| saku Fana Fa tigusa nagara ni ada naredo tare ka Fa Faru wo uramiFatetaru | The blossoms bloom In countless kinds Most fragile, yet Who is it that for springtime Is filling with despite? |
Fujiwara no Okikaze
Left (Win).
夢かさは野邊の千草の面影はほのぼの招く薄ばかりや
| yume ka sa wa nobe no chigusa no omokage wa honobono maneku susuki bakari ya |
Was it all a dream? Across the fields a thousand blooms Did meet my gaze; now Dimly beckoning Are there only fronds of miscanthus grass… |
513
Right.
むら薄たえだえ野邊に招けども下延ふ葛ぞ恨果てぬる
| murasusuki taedae nobe ni manekedomo shita hau kuzu zo uramihatenuru |
The clumps of miscanthus grass From time to time across the fields Do wave, yet The creeping arrowroot beneath Holds all my regrets… |
514
The Right state that the initial line of the Left’s poem is ‘awkward’ [amari nari], and that they cannot approve of the final use of ya. The Left wonder about the appropriateness of ‘Holds all my regrets’ (uramihatenuru).
Shunzei’s judgement: The Gentlemen of the Right have a number of criticisms of the Left’s poem. However, with careful consideration, while the poem is not tasteful in its entirety [subete yū ni shimo arazaredo], the initial line does not seem that strange, and the final ya is fine, is it not? The Right’s ‘The clumps of miscanthus grass from time to time across the fields do wave’ is tasteful [yū naru], but all that connects with ‘arrowroot’, is the subsequent ‘seeing what lies beneath’. ‘Arrowroot’ is too briefly in the poem for this. The initial and final sections of the Left’s poem have been criticised by the Gentlemen of the Right, but they are not without purpose. Thus, the Left wins.
