Having left my soul
behind at your unfeeling
sleeve, I find that I
am lost, and it is my own
heart that has bewildered me
- Meaning
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Having left my soul behind at your unfeeling sleeve, I am lost—and it is my own heart that has led me astray.
- Commentary
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Part Two: Yugiri
Unused to such expeditions, Yugiri went back to his own house at Sanjo with his mind still at Ono. His wife, Kumoinokari, had already noticed that he was not himself. That same day he sent a letter to the Fallen Leaf Princess, and this poem was in it. She would not answer, and his feeling was left hanging in the air. The letters that followed were what brought his wife's jealousy to a head.
"Left my soul behind" is the old poetic figure of a soul that goes out of the body and stays with someone else, standing for deep attachment. "Your unfeeling sleeve" is the Princess. "My own heart" gives the cause. "Lost" is being confused and adrift. Nothing at all had happened, and he nonetheless sends the poem in the exact form of a morning-after letter—putting the shape of a thing in place before the thing itself, which is very like him.
- Author
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Murasaki Shikibu
- Source
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Genji Monogatari
- Other
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