It is the world at
large that you have turned from, and
yet, taking the words
of your renouncing to me,
it is my own lot that hurts

Meaning

It is the world at large you have turned away from, and yet, taking your renunciation to myself, it is my own lot that hurts.

Commentary

Part Three: Tenarai

　The Captain sent this in to Ukifune as he was leaving. He knows that taking vows is a turning from the world in general, he says, and yet it feels to him as though he alone were being shut out. She was not moved by this either, and from here the Captain fades out of the tale. Life at Ono goes quietly on until, the next year, Kaoru learns that she is alive.

　"The world at large" grants that her vows were not taken to refuse any one man. Itou is to turn from the world in weariness of it. Yosete is to take a thing as a pretext, here to read her renunciation as aimed at himself. That he presses the point while knowing it will not bear is what gives the poem its urgency as a love poem.

Author

Murasaki Shikibu

Source

Genji Monogatari

Other

It is the world at large that you have turned from, and yet, taking the words of your renouncing to me, it is my own lot that hurts

It is the world at
large that you have turned from, and
yet, taking the words
of your renouncing to me,
it is my own lot that hurts