The wisteria,
that one might take for the sleeve
of a slender girl—
its color, too, may deepen
according to who beholds it

Meaning

The wisteria one might mistake for a slender girl's sleeve—its color too may deepen, according to who beholds it.

Commentary

Part One: Fujiura

　This is Kashiwagi's poem, made when the cup came round to him from Yugiri. The cup passed on and poems followed, but muddled by drink they did not come well, and none, the narrator says, bettered this. By the faint light of the moon of the seventh, the pond lay clear as a mirror, and the wisteria hanging over a recumbent pine was lovely past the ordinary. Presently the Lesser Captain sang the saibara "The Reed Fence" in his fine voice; the Minister joined in with the words altered, and the gathering grew easy, its old rancor melting away.

　"Taoyame" is a graceful girl—here his sister, Kumoinokari. "The wisteria one might take for a sleeve" likens the flower clusters to a girl's sleeve, the color of the one scarcely to be told from the other. "According to who beholds it" is: depending on the viewer. Since the flower's beauty deepens with the beholder, his sister too will be the lovelier for being taken by Yugiri: a blessing is folded in. Speaking as a brother, he wishes the match well, and the conceit of the wisteria for Kumoinokari runs on unbroken from the Minister's poem. As a poem of congratulation made with the cup at a feast, it wants for nothing.

Author

Murasaki Shikibu

Source

Genji Monogatari

Other

The wisteria, that one might take for the sleeve of a slender girl— its color, too, may deepen according to who beholds it

The wisteria,
that one might take for the sleeve
of a slender girl—
its color, too, may deepen
according to who beholds it