山の端に入るまで月を眺め見む
閨の板間もしるしありやと
閨の板間もしるしありやと
- Roma-ji
-
Yama no ha ni iru made tsuki o nagame mimu
neya no itama mo shirushi ari ya to - English Translation
-
I will watch the moon
until it enters the ridge,
to see whether there
is any sign of it in
the boards of the sleeping room
- Meaning
- I will watch the moon until it sinks behind the ridge, to see whether any sign of it shows through the boards of the sleeping room.
- Commentary
-
Part Three: Tenarai
The Captain's reply. He will watch till the moon goes down, he says, and under cover of the light that leaks between the boards of a sleeping room he lets his wish to see Ukifune show. He stayed the night at the house after all, and passed it with the old nun's koto and his own flute. Ukifune never answered him.
"Until it enters the ridge" is until the moon sets, taking up her "house near the ridge." "The boards of the sleeping room" leans on the old conceit of moonlight coming through the gaps in them. Shirushi is a sign, or an effect, and carries the sense of whether staying will have been worth it. Slipping the intention of a suit inside the language of refinement is exactly the form these exchanges take.
- Author
- Murasaki Shikibu
- Source
- Genji Monogatari
- Other
-
- Do not lay the blame on a house overgrown with creeper, for a hunting robe that has come here parting the dew of the autumn fields
- Is it that you are not one to look with feeling at the late-night moon, that you will not stay the night in a house so near the ridge
- Of things long ago that will not be forgotten, and at the hard joints of the flute-bamboo as well, I have wept aloud outright
- At the flute's voice, things long ago came back to me, and at the hour when you were turning home again my sleeves too were wet with tears