Round Four

Left (Win)

月きよみかひのしらねをながむればいつかは雪に空は晴れける

tsuki kiyomi kai no shirane o nagamureba itsuka wa yuki ni sora wa harekeru

When at the moon, so clear, Above the white peak of Kai I gaze, I wonder When the snow Will clear from the skies…

Shun’e
55

Right

くまもなき月みるほどの心にてやがて此よをすぐしてしかな

kuma mo naki tsuki miru hodo no kokoro nite yagate kono yo o sugushiteshi kana

When the cloudless Moon I see, My heart Longs within this world To ever stay!

Lord Michiyoshi
56

While the Left does contain some feelings, these seem not to be apparent in its diction. When moonlight is confused with snow, then I would want the composition to be about a location which has none, but mentioning the ‘white peak of Kai’ makes it unclear because it sounds as the composition is about its snow. Dropping a reference to Mount Obasute and replacing it with the ‘white peak of Kai’ sounds absurd and puts me in mind of the judgement in the Poetry Match at the Palace in the Fields. With all that being said, the Right’s poem appears pointlessly pedestrian, so the Left should win, I think.