Tag Archives: white sacred streamers

Tametadake shodo hyakushu 675

Before a shrine.

すみよしのまつのしづえにいくちよかなみのしらゆふかけてきぬらん

sumiyoshi no
matsu no shizue ni
ikuchiyo ka
nami no shirayū
kakete kinuran
At Sumiyoshi
The pines’ lower branches
For how many thousand ages
With the waves’ white sacred streamers
Have come to be hung.

Fujiwara no Tadanari
藤原忠成

SKKS XIX: 1913

Composed when various people produced poems, when Imperial Princess Sōshi of the First Order visited Sumiyoshi.

すみよしの浜松が枝に風ふけば浪のしらゆふかけぬまぞなき

 sumiyoshi no
hamamatsu ga e ni
kaze fukeba
nami no shirayū
kakenu ma zo naki
At Sumiyoshi
When the branches of the beach-pines
Are blown by the wind,
The waves with white sacred streamers
Are not hung in no place at all.

Fujiwara no Michitsune
藤原道経

Sumiyoshi-sha uta’awase kaō ni-nen 05

Round Five

Left (Win)

ゆふかくるここちこそすれすみよしのまつのこずゑをてらす月かげ

yū kakuru
kokochi koso sure
sumiyoshi no
matsu no kozue o
terasu tsukikage
All hung with sacred streamers
I feel they are—
At Sumiyoshi
The treetops of the pines
Shining in the moonlight.

Lord Fujiwara no Shigenori
Captain of the Outer Palace Guards, Left Division
Exalted Senior Third Rank[1]
9

Right

すみよしのまつのこずゑをみわたせばこよひぞかくる月のしらゆふ

sumiyoshi no
matsu no kozue o
miwataseba
koyoi zo kakuru
tsuki no shirayū
When, at Sumiyoshi
Over the treetops of the pines
I pass my gaze,
Hung are they, this midnight
With the moon’s white sacred streamers…

Lord Fujiwara no Morikata
Junior Fourth Rank, Lower Grade
Without Office[2]
10

Left and Right have produced poems on the moon, both with the conception of it resembling white sacred streamers hung on the treetops of the pines, while the differences between them are charming, it does not sound as if the poem of the Right has any reason for singling out ‘this midnight’, while nothing appears lacking in the beauty of the Left’s work and thus, once more, it wins.


[1] Shōsan’i-gyō sahyōe no kami Fujiwara ason Shigenori  正三位行左兵衛督藤原朝臣成範

[2] San’i jūshi’ige Fujiwara ason Morikata 散位従四位下藤原朝臣盛方