The light was shining
unclouded in the sky then—
why should you have let
your eyes be dimmed and blurred by
the snow of that day's progress?
- Meaning
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The light was shining unclouded in the sky—why should you have let your eyes be blurred by the snow of that day's progress?
- Commentary
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Part One: Miyuki
After his talk with Murasaki, Genji sent this back to Tamakazura, adding that she really must make up her mind; and he went on urging her without let. Meanwhile, resolving that in any case the donning of the train must come first, he had ever finer furnishings added for the ceremony. At the Rokujo estate even the smallest observance grew grand of itself, and since he now meant to use the occasion to reveal the truth to the Minister of the Center, the preparations were splendid to the point of crowding the rooms.
"Akane sasu" is a pillow word for light. "The light" takes up her own word and means the Emperor. "Miyuki" likewise repeats her pivot, progress against snow. "Let your eyes be blurred" says, on the surface, that the snow dazzled her—and underneath, that she must have seen perfectly well. Where she had hidden behind a rhetorical question, he pushes back with a question of his own, "why should you have?"; and though he speaks as a foster father urging her toward court, the exchange has something of the give-and-take of courtship in it. The chapter takes its name, Miyuki, from the progress to Oharano that these two poems turn upon.
- Author
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Murasaki Shikibu
- Source
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Genji Monogatari
- Other
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