橘の薫るあたりはほととぎす
心してこそ鳴くべかりけれ
心してこそ鳴くべかりけれ
- Roma-ji
-
Tachibana no kaoru atari wa hototogisu
kokoro shite koso nakubekarikere - English Translation
-
Where the fragrance of
the orange hangs in the air,
the cuckoo ought to
have taken more care of how
it lifted up its own voice
- Meaning
- Where the fragrance of the orange hangs, the cuckoo ought to have taken more care how it lifted its voice.
- Commentary
-
Part Three: Kagero
Niou's reply. He happened at that moment to be looking out at the garden with Naka no Kimi. Seeing that the letter had something behind it, he wrote this and added the words "awkward." It is an answer made in the knowledge that the other man has guessed, and after it Niou sent for Jiju, who knew how Ukifune had ended, and heard the whole story from her through a night.
In "where the orange is fragrant," kaoru, to be fragrant, carries Kaoru's name, and Niou lays himself over the cuckoo. That the bird should have sung with more care near the orange means that he should not have behaved lightly so near this man: it is an evasion, and at the same time an admission that he is in the wrong. Answering by working the other's name into the poem is a piece of wit very much in the manner of these two.
- Author
- Murasaki Shikibu
- Source
- Genji Monogatari
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-
Shinobine ya kimi mo nakuramu kai mo naki
shide no taosa ni kokoro kayowaba - Next Poem
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Ware mo mata uki furusato o arehateba
tare yadorigi no kage o shinobamu