classic waka stream

花の枝にいとど心をしむるかな
人のとがめん香をばつつめど
Roma-ji

Hana no e ni itodo kokoro o shimuru kana
hito no togamen ka o ba tsutsumedo

English Translation
It is to that branch
that my heart clings the closer—
though I keep folded
and hidden away the scent
that others would find fault with
Meaning
It is to that branch my heart clings the closer, though I keep hidden the scent that others would find fault with.
Commentary
Part One: Umegae

　This is Genji's reply, written on paper of the same red-plum color, with a spray from the garden broken off and tied to it. The Prince complained that it was a letter whose contents one could guess at, and that Genji was hiding something and hiding it deep, and showed himself very curious. "There is nothing in it," said Genji; "it is hard to be suspected of what is not there"—and while the inkstone was at hand he wrote this. Or so, at least, the narrator says it may have run.

　"That branch" takes up her "branch the flower has fallen from," and means the lady herself. "My heart clings" is a heart dyed fast, with the dyeing of scent behind it. "The scent that others would find fault with" is a love the world must not learn of. "Tsutsumu" is to wrap up and to keep back, folding incense and folding feeling together. Under the cover of an exchange about incense he lets her know that his feeling has not ended—with the Prince at his elbow agog to know. That the narrator ends with "or so it may have run" shows she is quite aware how near the edge the poem goes.
Author
Murasaki Shikibu
Source
Genji Monogatari
Other