gazing on the flowers,
while I wait for one to come—
white as fine cloth sleeves,
so I thought them and mistook
what I saw before my eyes
- Meaning
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While gazing at the flowers and waiting for someone to come, I mistook them for the white sleeves of a robe.
- Commentary
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Book Five Autumn Poems (Part Two)
A poem composed on seeing a suhama in which a person waits for someone beneath chrysanthemum blossoms.
It expresses that the white chrysanthemums were mistaken for the sleeves of the person being awaited. In reality, such a mistake would not occur, but it suggests an illusion born from longing and anticipation.
- Author
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Ki no Tomonori
- Source
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Kokin Wakashu
- Other
-
-
raised by autumn winds
upon the shore of Fukiage, stand
these white chrysanthemums—
are they flowers, or could they be
the waves that gather on the shore?
-
drenched, I dry my robes
on a mountain path, among
chrysanthemums—
within the space of this dew,
when did I pass a thousand years?
-
thinking it but one,
this chrysanthemum I saw—
in Ōsawa pond,
even on the pond’s deep floor,
who could have planted it so?
-
while autumn chrysanthemums
shine in all their fragrance,
I shall wear them—
for I know not my own life,
if it end before these flowers