To the bay of Suma
in the sea of Suruga
in Hitachi—come,
rise up and show yourself, waves:
the pines of Hakozaki wait
- Meaning
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To the bay of Suma in the sea of Suruga in Hitachi—rise up and come, waves; the pines of Hakozaki are waiting.
- Commentary
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Part One: Tokonatsu
The letter was carried to the kitchen quarters and passed on to the Kokiden Consort. She smiled, set it down, and remarking that cursive was beyond her and that the thing seemed to have neither beginning nor end, handed it to Chunagon, who was in attendance. An answer, she said, must be written with the same show of learning or its writer would be thought a poor hand—and left it to her; and the younger women, though they kept their faces straight, all laughed. Chunagon, saying that it would be unkind to let the reply look like a secretary's work, imitated the Consort's hand exactly and sent back this poem. When she read it out, the Consort protested that it was dreadful and that the girl would go about saying she had written it herself; but Chunagon answered that anyone who heard it would know better, wrapped it, and sent it off. The lady of Omi read it, delighted—she says she is waiting for me!—burned sweet incense over and over, painted herself scarlet with rouge, and combed out her hair.
"Hitachi," "the sea of Suruga," and "the bay of Suma" are three famous places in three unrelated provinces, strung together in exact imitation of the other lady's manner. "Rise up and come" means: do come to us. "The pines of Hakozaki," a poetic place in Chikuzen, plays "matsu," pine, against "matsu," to wait. The poem says only: come, I am waiting—and is quite as much of a jumble as the one it answers. To reply in the manner of the sender is proper practice in an exchange of poems; here that practice is itself the joke. What passed at their meeting is never told, and the tale moves on to the chapter of the Cressets.
- Author
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Murasaki Shikibu
- Source
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Genji Monogatari
- Other
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