It is I who must
sleep the night out on the shore
at Akashi—yet
in these same waves the moon still
finds a place to lodge itself
- Meaning
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It is I who must sleep out the night on the shore at Akashi; and yet in these same waves the moon still finds its lodging.
- Commentary
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Volume Eleven: The Sacred Mirror Enters the Capital
After Sochi-no-suke's two poems, Dainagon-no-suke gave voice to this one. Even the eastern warriors, who knew nothing of poetry, felt for the women and supposed they must be longing for the past.
On the twenty-fifth, nobles headed by the Middle Counselor Tsunefusa went out as far as Toba to receive the sacred mirror and the box holding the jewel.
Dainagon-no-suke was the wife of Shigehira, and at the close of this volume she will have her last meeting with him before he is handed over to the monks of Nara.
Akashi is usually punned on akashi, "bright"; here it is used simply as a place name and joined to "sleeping on a journey." She calls being carried along as a prisoner a journey. Renaming her ruin as travel is what keeps the language of the poem intact.
The lower verse is the point. She is reduced to sleeping on a shore, and in those same waves the moon takes lodging. The moon does not choose its places: it falls on a palace pond and on the water off a prisoner's landing alike.
Whether that is consolation depends on the reader. It can be taken as the comfort of something that has not withdrawn, or as the indifference of a moon to which their fall means nothing. The exclamatory kana settles neither way.
Sochi-no-suke's poems set past against present by way of "above the clouds." This one looks only at the water in front of her. Of the three, it stands closest to the present moment.
waga mi koso……as for myself.
Akashi no ura……the shore in Harima famous for its moon.
tabine……sleeping away from home.
seme……though I must do so.
onaji nami……these same waves.
yadoru……to lodge; to be reflected.
Dainagon-no-suke……the wife of Taira no Shigehira.
naishidokoro……the sacred mirror.
shirushi no on-hako……the box containing the sacred jewel.
Tsunefusa……Fujiwara no Tsunefusa, Middle Counselor.
- Source
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Heike Monogatari
- Other
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