Takekawa no sono yo no koto wa omoiizu ya
shinobu bakari no fushi wa nakeredo

English Translation

Do you remember
that night when we sang the song
Takekawa through
though there was no joint in it
worth the keeping in the mind

Meaning

Do you remember that night when Takekawa was sung, though there was nothing in it worth keeping in mind?

Commentary

Part Three: Takekawa

　The new year came and the men's dance-and-song was performed. Kaoru was chosen to lead the right, and the Chamberlain Lieutenant was among the musicians. Under a cloudless moon of the fourteenth night the company left the palace and went on to the Retired Emperor's. The elder sister watched from her curtained place, and the Lieutenant, knowing she was there, could not settle; when he sang Takekawa and moved up to the foot of the steps, the memory of that earlier evening's music brought him near tears. Kaoru went the rounds all night, and the next day was called in and attended the Retired Emperor to her rooms. Sitting a while at the gallery door and talking with a woman whose voice he knew, he was given this poem from within the blind.

　Takekawa is the name of a saibara song and the name of this chapter. "Take" plays against "yo" and "fushi," the joint of a bamboo and an occasion in one's life. She says there was nothing in that night worth remembering, and yet she is the one bringing it up, which is the point of the poem. Slight as it is, it brought tears to Kaoru's eyes and made him see for himself how much he had felt. The night he had once sung Takekawa at the Tamakazura house is called up again here, and it draws the chapter toward its close.

Author

Murasaki Shikibu

Source

Genji Monogatari

Other

Takekawa no sono yo no koto wa omoiizu ya shinobu bakari no fushi wa nakeredo

Takekawa no sono yo no koto wa omoiizu ya
shinobu bakari no fushi wa nakeredo