At that first parting
I thought all grief had been used
up and gone from me,
and here again the sorrow
of this world has grown the more

Meaning

At that parting I thought grief had been exhausted, and now again the wretchedness of this world has only grown.

Commentary

Part One: Suma

　Genji answered her poem with this one. Losing his father should have used up all sorrow, he says, and now exile has been added on top of it. There was much on both sides, and their minds were too disordered for any of it to be said. He then waited for the moon to rise and set out for the grave in the northern hills.

　"That parting" is the death of his father. "I thought it was used up" says that grief had already reached its limit. "Usa" is wretchedness. Grief thought finished and then increased—the structure states a recognition that there is more suffering past the limit, and puts him on exactly the ground of her "nothing gained by it."

Author

Murasaki Shikibu

Source

Genji Monogatari

Other

At that first parting I thought all grief had been used up and gone from me, and here again the sorrow of this world has grown the more

At that first parting
I thought all grief had been used
up and gone from me,
and here again the sorrow
of this world has grown the more