Ōzora o wataru haruhi no kage nare ya yoso ni nomi shite nodokekaruramu

English Translation

Are you the light of
the spring sun crossing the wide
sky, that you should stay
always away, somewhere else
unhurried, taking your ease

Meaning

Are you the light of the spring sun crossing the wide sky, that you stay always elsewhere and take your ease?

Commentary

48 The Light of the Spring Sun

In the reign of the previous emperor, a lady of the wardrobe known as the Lady of Gyōbu had withdrawn to her family home and did not return for a long time, and the emperor sent her this poem. The prose says no more, and the section consists of this single poem.
The Lady of Gyōbu was a lady of the wardrobe, a rank below that of imperial consort, and took her name from the ministry of that title. Of the previous emperor the prose tells us nothing beyond the designation.
The setting is the period of her stay at home. The spring sun in the poem tells us the season.
What prompted the poem was her long absence. It was sent to her at her family home.
The section ends with the poem; no reply from her is recorded. It was later included in the Shinkokin-shū.

The opening names the light of the spring sun crossing the wide sky; the word rendered as light is the one used of sunlight and moonlight.
The second line asks whether that is what she is, and puts the question as the reason for her behaviour.
The third line says she is always elsewhere, its particle of limitation marking that she is never here.
The closing supposes her at her ease. The spring sun crosses the sky unhurried, and that unhurried crossing is laid over a woman who stays at home and does not return. It is an emperor summoning a woman, and it gives no order — only a comparison, and a question.

Source

Yamato Monogatari

Other