Weeping, I have come
back again after all—this
borrowed world of ours
is nowhere, in the end, a
land that goes on without change
- Meaning
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Weeping, I have come back after all; this borrowed world is nowhere, in the end, a land that goes on unchanged.
- Commentary
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Part Two: Maboroshi
Late in spring, hearing the geese going home, Genji went to see the Akashi lady. She had given her daughter, the Akashi Empress, into Murasaki no Ue's keeping, and no one grieved for her more deeply. But since Murasaki's death Genji could settle nowhere. He sent this poem then. The Akashi lady answered, letting him know quietly that he had not come for a long time. He went on that year finding no comfort wherever he was.
"Weeping" carries the sound of a bird's cry, so that the geese are in the word. "Come back" likens him to the geese returning from the eternal land. "This borrowed world" holds the word for goose inside the word for borrowed. "A land that goes on without change" is that eternal country, and some hear in it the word for a marriage bed. One image of geese carries migration, return, and lodging all at once—a poem thick with technique, about a man who can rest nowhere.
- Author
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Murasaki Shikibu
- Source
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Genji Monogatari
- Other
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