That Suminoe is
a shore where a life has been
worth the living—this
the nun who has grown old here
will know, perhaps, only today
- Meaning
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That Suminoe is a shore where a life has been worth living—the old nun will know it, perhaps, only today.
- Commentary
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Part Two: Wakana Ge
The Akashi nun answered Genji's poem with this one. She had once worried over her daughter's future on the Akashi shore and had gone on making her vows to the god of Sumiyoshi, and now she stood in the place where her granddaughter's rise was being celebrated. She says that her long life has been worth living, and lays it on the name of the shore itself. Afterward the party played the sacred music all night, and at daybreak, in a heavy frost, the fortune of the Akashi family was spoken of again.
"Suminoe" is another name for Sumiyoshi, the one used of it as a stretch of coast. "Worth the living" puns shells against worth, binding the shore and the meaning of a life into a single word. "Nun" sounds the word for a fisher, laying her own vows over the people who work the shallows—a play the Akashi poems return to again and again. She also receives Genji's "Sumiyoshi" and gives it back as "Suminoe," carrying the exchange's words forward exactly.
- Author
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Murasaki Shikibu
- Source
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Genji Monogatari
- Other
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