They cry that they draw near
toward my side—those trusting geese
of Miyoshino;
how could I ever forget them?
- Meaning
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They cry that they draw near toward my side—those trusting geese of Miyoshino; how could I ever forget them?
- Commentary
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Episode Ten: "The trusting wild geese"
A man traveled aimlessly as far as Musashi Province and sought to marry a young woman who lived there.
This poem was composed by the man in reply to the mother’s poem, "On Miyoshino’s fields, even the trusting wild geese, in all earnestness, cry as they draw near toward your side."
In those days, such exchanges of poems in matters of love were regarded as elegant.
- Source
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Ise Monogatari
- Other
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If you truly bear the name,
come, let me ask you,
O capital bird:
does the one I think upon
still live, or not?
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On Miyoshino’s fields,
the trusting wild geese too,
all in earnest,
cry as they draw near
toward your side.
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Forget me not,
though for a time I seem
lost in the clouds,
until, like the moon that crosses the sky,
we meet again.
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Musashino—
do not burn it today;
in the young grass
my beloved husband hides,
and I too lie hidden.