Since I have made you
tame, a keepsake of the one
I long for in vain—
be used to me, then; and why
is this the cry you cry now
- Meaning
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I have tamed you as a keepsake of the one I long for in vain—be used to me, then; and why is this the cry you give?
- Commentary
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Part Two: Wakana Ge
At the end of the preceding chapter, on the day of the kickball at the Rokujo residence, a Chinese cat had dragged up a blind and Kashiwagi had caught sight of the Third Princess. He could not put the sight aside, and came to want at least the cat that had been there that day. He went to the Heir Apparent, who was fond of cats, offered up another of the same line, and by such means at last got the Princess's own cat into his keeping. He kept it beside him even at night, and one evening, hearing it cry, he spoke this poem to himself. The attachment was never checked, and it led in the end to what passed between him and the Princess.
"The one I long for in vain" is the Third Princess. "Keepsake" is what stands in for someone absent, and shows that he is treating the cat as her substitute. "Made you tame" is taming an animal to the hand. "Be used to me" is a call to the cat, and it is also what he hears in the sound it makes. Speaking to a cat rather than to a person lets what he cannot say aloud leak out, and the scene is among the ones no reader of the tale forgets.
- Author
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Murasaki Shikibu
- Source
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Genji Monogatari
- Other
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