What am I to do?
The trailing leaves of the vine
are withering—well,
I shall leave it to the sun
of spring, and trouble no more
- Meaning
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What is to be done? The trailing leaves of the wisteria are withering. I shall leave it to the spring sun, and trouble myself no further.
- Commentary
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Volume Seven: The Emperor Leaves the Capital
With Kiso Yoshinaka's army closing in, the cloistered emperor Go-Shirakawa seems to have divined the Taira's intentions. Taking only Suketoki, son of the Major Counselor Sukekata, he slipped out of his palace to no one knew where. Not a soul noticed.
On night duty at the Hōjū-ji palace was a quick-witted Taira retainer named Kitsunai Saemon-no-jō Suehiro. Hearing a commotion and stifled weeping from the imperial apartments, he listened and caught voices asking where the cloistered emperor had gone, that he was nowhere to be seen. Suehiro hurried word to Rokuhara, and Munemori rushed to the Hōjū-ji—where indeed the cloistered emperor alone was gone. News of the disappearance ran through the capital at once, and for a house that had kept its composure until then it was a decisive blow.
Now only the child emperor remained to them. That day the six-year-old sovereign was carried into his palanquin in the arms of his mother, Kenreimon-in. That he could understand nothing of it made it the more pitiful. The Major Counselor Tokitada called out that the sacred sword, the mirror, the lutes Genjō and Suzuka must not be forgotten; but in the confusion much was left behind, including the ceremonial sword lying in the emperor's own chamber.
The regent Motomichi had joined the procession, but near Shichijō-Ōmiya a boy crossed in front of his carriage. Glancing at him, Motomichi saw written on the boy's left sleeve the words "spring sun"—the name of Kasuga, the tutelary god of the Fujiwara. He took heart at that; and then, seemingly in the boy's voice, this poem was heard.
Was it the god's instruction to leave everything to Kasuga? Motomichi turned to his attendant Takanao and remarked that although the emperor was in procession no one knew where the cloistered emperor was, and the outlook was uncertain—hinting that he did not wish to go west. Takanao caught his master's meaning at once and signed to the ox-driver, who understood, and turned the carriage north, away from the retreat, and ran it to the Chisoku-in in the northern hills.
"The trailing leaves of the wisteria" are the descendants of the Fujiwara. Wisteria is a plant whose flowers and leaves both hang down, so that withering leaves fall naturally into place as the decline of a house.
The point is haru no hi, at once the spring sun and Kasuga Daimyōjin, the Fujiwara tutelary god. Wisteria blooms in spring sunlight, so to leave a withering vine to the spring sun means to leave the house's fortunes to its god. Motomichi took it as an instruction not to share the Taira's fate.
The Tale of the Heike sets down several oracular poems: the one Narichika heard in a dream in Volume One, and the one that formed in insect-eaten leaves in Volume Two. The first was ignored and ruin followed; the second led to a pardon. This one is a case where only the man who heeded it was saved. Motomichi stayed in the capital, and the Taira went west.
ikani sen……what is to be done?
fuji no sueba……the last leaves of the wisteria; the Fujiwara descendants.
kareyuku……withering, declining.
haru no hi……the spring sun, punning on Kasuga.
makasete yamin……shall I leave it at that?
Sesshō Motomichi……Fujiwara no Motomichi, married to a daughter of Kiyomori.
kokumo……the emperor's mother; here Kenreimon-in Tokuko.
Genjō, Suzuka……famous instruments kept at the palace.
Chisoku-in……a temple in the northern hills.
tonoi……night guard duty.
- Source
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Heike Monogatari
- Other
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