The very wind, it
seems, has the grace to keep clear
of these flowering boughs—
should I blow my way so near
that the birds can bear no more?

Meaning

Even the wind, it seems, has the grace to keep clear of these flowering boughs; should I blow my way so near that the birds can bear no more?

Commentary

Part One: Umegae

　This is Yugiri's answer to Kashiwagi. When he added, "How unfeeling of you," the whole company laughed. The Lesser Captain followed, and toward dawn the Prince went home; and for a parting gift Genji sent out to his carriage a set of his own informal robes with two jars of untouched incense.

　"Having a heart" credits the wind, which has none, with feeling: the flowers are so lovely that even the wind keeps off. "Toriaenu" is being too hard pressed to take hold of anything, with "tori," bird, hidden in it, answering the warbler and its roost in the poem before. "Should I blow my way near?" turns aside the praise of his flute with a show of modesty: if the wind itself forbears, would it not be crude to press close with a flute? The compliment is deflected by an argument out of pure elegance—and the young man whom the narrator once called clumsy at verse shows here that he knows exactly how such an evening is played.

Author

Murasaki Shikibu

Source

Genji Monogatari

Other

The very wind, it seems, has the grace to keep clear of these flowering boughs— should I blow my way so near that the birds can bear no more?

The very wind, it
seems, has the grace to keep clear
of these flowering boughs—
should I blow my way so near
that the birds can bear no more?