The palace guards
and their men stand far aside;
in the unswept court,
where no one tends the garden,
flowers have fallen and lie.
- Meaning
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The palace guards and their men stand idly by, and in the court no one bothers to sweep; in that neglected garden, fallen flowers now lie scattered across the ground.
- Commentary
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Section Twenty-Seven: The Festival of the Transfer of the Realm. This poem takes as its original poem a verse from the Shūishū: “If the palace guards and their men had any feeling, they would not sweep only on spring mornings” (by Minamoto no Kintada). It conveys the Retired Emperor’s melancholy and his feelings expressed through fallen blossoms. The garden refers to that of the Tsuchimikado Palace of the former Emperor Hanazono. “The palace guards and their men” is a poetic expression for the lower-ranking officials who were engaged in duties such as cleaning in the Office of Palace Maintenance.
- Author
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Yoshida Kenko
- Source
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Tsurezuregusa
- Other
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While snow still falls,
spring has already arrived;
the bush warbler’s
tears, once frozen in the cold—
are they melting now?
-
The fence I knew
of the girl I once beheld
has fallen to ruin;
amid mingled cogon grass,
violets alone remain.
-
Two strokes for “ko,”
the ox-horn shape for “i,”
the straight line “shi,”
the crooked form for “ku”—
thus, my lord, you are.
-
On plum-blossomed boughs,
a bush warbler comes to rest;
calling for the spring—
yet still, though it calls and calls,
the snow keeps falling down.