This chrysanthemum,
its young leaves a pale green—did
anyone dream, even
by so much as a drop of dew,
it would take the deep purple's hue?
- Meaning
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This chrysanthemum, its young leaves pale green—did anyone dream, by so much as a drop of dew, that it would take the deep purple's hue?
- Commentary
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Part One: Fujiura
In autumn the Minister of the Center rose to Chancellor, and Yugiri was made a Counselor. Seeing his son come, more radiant than ever, to make the rounds of thanks for the promotion, Genji thought from time to time of the night when Kumoinokari's nurse, the Taifu, had sneered at Yugiri's low rank—"a sixth-rank destiny." So he had a beautifully faded chrysanthemum brought, added this poem, and gave it with a most fragrant smile, saying, "I cannot forget that sharp word of hers." Yugiri was abashed and sorry, yet found his father charming.
"The chrysanthemum with young leaves of pale green" is a plant not yet colored, and, with the pale green of the sixth-rank robe behind it, stands for Yugiri as he was. "The deep purple" is the robe of the third rank and above—Yugiri now a Counselor. "By so much as a drop of dew" is even a little, with the dew on the chrysanthemum sounded in it. "Kakeki ya" is: did one imagine it? No. Who would have thought that pale young chrysanthemum would take so deep a purple?—the father's satisfaction at wiping out the nurse's scorn, and his joy in his son's rise, entrusted to the changing color of the flower. Naming a rise in rank by the passage from green to purple, it is a poem full of quiet triumph.
- Author
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Murasaki Shikibu
- Source
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Genji Monogatari
- Other
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