雪深き汀の小芹誰がために
摘みかはやさむ親なしにして
摘みかはやさむ親なしにして
- Roma-ji
-
Yuki fukaki migiwa no koseri ta ga tame ni
tsumi ka hayasamu oya nashi ni shite - English Translation
-
For whose sake now should
I gather and make much of
the little cress at
the deep-snowed edge of the stream,
having no parent living
- Meaning
- For whose sake should I gather and make much of the little cress at the snow-deep water's edge, having no parent left?
- Commentary
-
Part Three: Shiigamoto
Naka no Kimi added this after her sister's poem on the bracken. Looking at the cress the abbot had sent, she laments that there is no longer a father to set it before. The pair of poems closes here, and once the sisters' solitude has been pressed on the reader the scene turns to spring.
The little cress at the water's edge grows by the stream and, with bracken, belongs to the greens of early spring. The ko of koseri sounds as ko, child, and pairs with "no parent" in the closing line. Tsumi kawayasu is to gather and prize a thing, that is, to receive a gift with pleasure. With no one left to be pleased, the season's bounty means nothing, and parent and child, set as a pair, hold the lament up.
- Author
- Murasaki Shikibu
- Source
- Genji Monogatari
- Prev Poem
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Kimi ga oru mine no warabi to mimashikaba
shirare ya semashi haru no shirushi mo - Next Poem
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Tsute ni mishi yado no sakura o kono haru wa
kasumi hedatezu orite kazasamu