I do not forget
how I long for one who is
gone from us—and yet,
before all else, today my
heart goes as it would wish to

Meaning

I do not forget how I long for the one who is gone, and yet before all else, today my heart goes as it would wish.

Commentary

Part Three: Sawarabi

　Following Taifu no Kimi, another gentlewoman answered with this. She says first that her longing for the dead Oigimi has not changed, and then, plainly, that today, going up to the capital, she is glad. The two poems together show servants who look for some relief even inside their grief. When the party had left Uji, only Ben the nun remained, and the plum in the garden and the warbler met a spring with no master in the house.

　Suginishi is one who has passed away, here Oigimi. Tamazu mo is before anything else, and says that grief may be set aside for the day. Against the weight of the contrary-to-fact wish in the poem before, this one states the present feeling as it is, so that the pair supplies both the lament and the relief. A side of the Uji story seen from the servants' position is filled in here, briefly.

Author

Murasaki Shikibu

Source

Genji Monogatari

Other

I do not forget how I long for one who is gone from us—and yet, before all else, today my heart goes as it would wish to

I do not forget
how I long for one who is
gone from us—and yet,
before all else, today my
heart goes as it would wish to