Since my lord dwells here,
this too is a moon that hangs
above a palace—
and still what I long for is
the capital, after all
- Meaning
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Since my lord dwells here, this too is a moon above a palace—and still what I long for is the capital after all.
- Commentary
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Volume Ten: Fujito
On the twenty-eighth of the seventh month the new emperor, Go-Toba, acceded. But an accession without the three regalia was without precedent in all of history. Noriyori was made governor of Mikawa and Yoshitsune an officer of the Left Gate Guards—which is how Yoshitsune came to be called the Kurō Hōgan.
Autumn had begun to steal into the capital: wind across the reeds, the faint sound of insects, the rustling of rice in the ear, and the season deepening day by day. Autumn is melancholy at the best of times, and the Taira, meeting it far from home in precarious circumstances, felt it the more.
Men who had once amused themselves with spring blossoms deep within the palace were now looking at an autumn moon from the beach at Yashima. Watching that clear moon, it was no wonder their thoughts went at once to the sky over home, to the capital, and to those they loved. There Taira no Yukimori composed this.
Kumoi is the sky and also the imperial palace. Where the emperor is, is the palace; the emperor is here at Yashima; therefore Yashima too is kumoi. The reasoning is set up first.
It is consoling reasoning: since the sovereign with the regalia is here, here is the court. It rests on the same logic as the granting of rank at Fukuhara in Volume Nine.
Then the lower verse pulls it down. Still, what I long for is the capital. The particle keri registers a realization, as of something noticed in the act of speaking. He builds the argument and then notices that it does not work on him. That whole process happens inside thirty-one syllables.
In Volume Eight, on the thirteenth night of the ninth month, three poems stood together—Tadanori's, Tsunemori's, Tsunemasa's. Those too were moon poems at Yashima. A year later, the same autumn, the same place, the same moon. But there are fewer poets. Tadanori and Tsunemasa were both killed at Ichi-no-tani that spring.
kimi……the sovereign; here Emperor Antoku.
sumeba……since he dwells here.
kumoi……the sky; also the imperial palace.
nao……still, even so.
koishiki……longed for.
miyako narikeri……it was the capital after all.
Yukimori……Taira no Yukimori, son of Motomori and grandson of Kiyomori.
Yashima……the Taira base in Sanuki.
kokonoe……the palace.
ogi……a reed growing by water, heading in autumn.
- Source
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Heike Monogatari
- Other
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