On a winter night,
no easy sleep, and waking
lonely—how brief was
that dream, all tangled and choked,
that came and was gone so soon.

Meaning

On a winter night of no easy sleep and lonely waking, how short it was—that dream, all tangled and choked, that came and went so soon.

Commentary

Part One: Asagao

　After Genji had gone to his bedchamber, lying there with the late Fujitsubo on his mind, he saw her, faint as in a dream. She seemed deeply resentful, telling him that the secret had come out and shamed her, that she suffered and it was hard to bear. As he tried to answer, a feeling came over him as of being set upon, and Murasaki beside him called, "What is the matter?"—and he woke. His breast choked with the grief and vexation of the broken dream, he wept as he spoke this solitary poem.

　"No easy sleep" means being unable to sleep softly and at ease. "Lonely waking" is the desolation felt on waking. "A winter night" is the cold, bleak night of winter. "Tangled and choked" is the heart clouded and unclearing, and also plays on a dream being knit. "How brief the dream" is the shortness of the dream he saw. His vexation that the dream of Fujitsubo, speaking her resentment, broke off so soon he lays over the lonely waking of a winter night, entrusting to it his unending feeling for the dead.

Author

Murasaki Shikibu

Source

Genji Monogatari

Other

On a winter night, no easy sleep, and waking lonely—how brief was that dream, all tangled and choked, that came and was gone so soon.

On a winter night,
no easy sleep, and waking
lonely—how brief was
that dream, all tangled and choked,
that came and was gone so soon.