Sent with something to Dharma Master Sosen[i] when he was away.
| oki tsu nami yasoshima kakete sumu chidori kokoro hitotsu to ikaga tanomamu | The waves out in the offing Break o’er the eighty islets, where Plovers dwell— Our hearts as one: How can I trust that? |
607
[i] Sosen 素暹 (?-1263) did not take orders until 1245-46, some twenty-six years after Sanetomo’s assassination in 1219, so at the time of this poem’s composition, he would still have been known by his secular name, Tō no Taneyuki 東胤行.Taneyuki, like his father, Shigetani 重胤 (1177?-1247?) was a close attendant of Sanetomo, and he continued this service after the latter’s death, eventually serving Kujō Yoritsune 九条頼経 (1218-1256), Kujō Yoritsugu 九条頼嗣 (1239-1256) and Prince Munetaka 宗尊(1242-1274), the fourth, fifth and sixth Kamakura shoguns, respectively, although Shigetani took orders following Sanetomo’s death. Both father and son were known as waka poets, with Sosen having twenty-two poems in imperial anthologies from Shokugosenshū.