中絶えむものならなくに橋姫の
片敷く袖や夜半に濡らさむ
片敷く袖や夜半に濡らさむ
- Roma-ji
-
Nakataemu mono naranaku ni hashihime no
katashiku sode ya yowa ni nurasamu - English Translation
-
It is not that we
are to be broken off, and
yet must you, like the
lady of the bridge, wet through
your lone sleeve in the night hours
- Meaning
- It is not that we are to be broken off, and yet must you, like the lady of the bridge, wet your lone sleeve through the night?
- Commentary
-
Part Three: Agemaki
Forbidden by his mother the Akashi Empress to leave the palace, Niou could no longer go to Uji. Troubled at the break in his visits, he sent this. Naka no Kimi answered, but the days of waiting went on, and Oigimi, watching, grew more anxious still.
Nakatayu is for a bond to be broken, and naka also sounds as the middle of the Uji bridge. Hashihime is the goddess of that bridge, and since the chapter of her name she has stood for a woman who waits. "The lone sleeve spread out" is the bedding of one who sleeps alone, and looks back to the Kokinshu poem about the lady of Uji bridge. The one word bridge holds both the distance and the tie.
- Author
- Murasaki Shikibu
- Source
- Genji Monogatari
- Other
-
- Though I do not say that we have worn the night robe until it grew soft, surely I am not without the right to a grievance
- Though our hearts may pass between us without a screen, I would have you not speak of sleeves that have grown soft with long wearing, one on one
- Am I to go on waiting out the far reaches of the Uji bridge, with nothing to trust in but your word that it will not break
- Even the foot of the tree I saw once, that time, when the flowers were at their height—even that place is desolate in autumn