Ware wa sa wa yuki furu sora ni kiene to ya tachikaeredomo akenu itado wa

English Translation

So I am to melt
away into the snowing
sky, then — is that it
I have come back, and the plank
door does not open for me

Meaning

So I am to vanish into the snowing sky, is that it? I have come back, and the plank door does not open.

Commentary

65 Do You Mean Me to Die

The fifth son of the Nan'in house was Governor of Mikawa. He fell in love with the Lady of Iyo, who lived in the Jōkyōden. When he sent word that he wished to visit, she replied that she was about to go up to the palace to wait on the Lady of the Bedchamber, and he sent "Tamadare no uchi to kakuru wa itodoshiku kage o miseji to omou narikeri". He also composed "Nageki nomi shigeki miyama no hototogisu kogakure ite mo ne o nomi zo naku". When at last he reached her, he was coldly told to go home for that day, and composed "Shine tote ya tori mo aezu wa yarawaruru ito ikigataki kokochi koso sure". Her reply to this was said to have been a good one, but it is not known. Again, on a snowy night, she talked with him and then, saying the night was late, sent him off; he had gone part of the way when the snow grew too heavy to go on, and he came back to find the door barred against him, and stayed where he was, composing "Ware wa sa wa yuki furu sora ni kiene to ya tachikaeredomo akenu itado wa". The woman said afterwards that since he composed poems like that and spoke with such feeling, she had wondered what to do and had looked through the door — but his face, after all, would not do. That is the whole of the section.
The fifth son of the Nan'in house served as Governor of Mikawa, the head of that province's administration. The Jōkyōden was one of the halls of the women's quarters, ranked next after Kokiden. The Lady of Iyo lived there.
The setting is a night of snow. She had talked with him and then, saying the night was late, sent him off; he had gone part of the way when the snow grew too heavy, and had come back.
What prompted the poem was finding the door barred and not opened to him. He stayed where he was, composing.
Afterwards, the prose says, she explained that since he composed poems like that and spoke with such feeling, she had wondered what to do and had looked out through the door — but his face, after all, would not do. The section closes on that remark.

The opening turns the matter back on himself: so then, I —
What follows asks whether he is to vanish into the snowing sky. The verb belongs with snow and is also the polite way of naming death, so that melting away and dying are the same word.
The concessive in the fourth line marks the point: he has come back, and yet.
The poem ends inverted, naming the unopened door last of all. That the grievance is addressed to a door rather than a person is exactly the position of a man shut out. And since the section closes with the woman's remark about his face, four poems' worth of pleading turns out to have been refused for a reason entirely apart from them.

Source

Yamato Monogatari

Other