Though one turns away,
One does not mount upon clouds
And fly from the world;
Yet the bitter things of life
Are said to grow far away.
- Meaning
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Even if one turns away from the world and becomes a nun, it is not as though one mounts the clouds and flies away. Yet they say that the painful things of this world grow distant.
- Commentary
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102. Though One Turns Away
There was a certain man. Though he did not compose poems, he understood well the feelings that arise between men and women. A noble lady had become a nun, and finding human relationships painful, she lived in a mountain village far from the capital.
The poem was composed and sent by the man, who was related to the woman who had become a nun.
This woman was an Imperial Princess who had served as the Saiō of the Ise Shrine.
Those who have fully known the complexities of human relationships and the depth of human emotions, yet cannot completely cut themselves free from them, may feel a certain longing for the way renunciation places distance between oneself and the world.
- Source
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Ise Monogatari
- Other
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