Omoioku kokoro todome wa furusato no shimo ni mo kareji yamato nadeshiko

English Translation

The heart you leave here,
the thought that stays behind you—
in the old home's frost
they shall not wither at all,
the pinks of this land of ours.

Meaning

Because the heart you leave behind remains here, the pinks of Yamato will not wither, not even in the frost of the old capital.

Commentary

Section 3 The Parting Exchange of Poems

After the death of her husband Fujiwara no Tameie, Abutsu-ni fell into dispute with Tameie's heir Tameuji over the inheritance of the Hosokawa estate in Harima Province, and when her suit in the capital came to nothing she resolved to appeal directly to the shogunal court in Kamakura. As she made ready to leave, the garden and the brushwood fence, already grown wild even while she had kept them under her eye, seemed certain to grow wilder still in her absence, and the tears on the sleeves of those who clung to her could not be consoled. The Jiju and the Taifu in particular sank into such dejection that it pained her, and after talking them round she looked into the sleeping chamber and found the old pillow of the departed lying just as it had always lain. From there the parting exchanges follow one upon another: the poem written beside the pillow; the poem sent with the notebooks of verse handed down in the house, sealed with a colophon and dispatched to the Jiju; the Jiju's reply; the poem the Taifu set down in his writing practice and the answer added on the same sheet; the poem of the Risshi, the elder brother who came down from the mountain to see her off; the poem of the Ajari no Kimi, who was to travel with her as guide; and the poem sent to her only daughter, in service at the women's palace, together with her reply. Abutsu-ni records that she has written out the poems of her five children without leaving any out, admitting that to a parent's heart every one of them seemed moving, and then, telling herself that such weakness will not do, she casts it all off and sets out.

Abutsu-ni was a consort of Fujiwara no Tameie and the mother of Tamesuke and Tamemori. Tameie was a poet of the Mikohidari house and a son of Fujiwara no Teika. The Jiju is her son Reizei Tamesuke, founder of the Reizei house, seventeen by the old count at this time; the Taifu is his younger brother Tamemori, then fifteen. The Risshi is a son in holy orders, called in the text the Jiju's elder brother, whom the interlinear note names Gensho. The Ajari no Kimi is a mountain ascetic, described in the text as elder than these, whom the note names Keiyu. There was only one daughter, in service at what the text calls the women's palace close by, which the note identifies as Shin'yomeimon'in. Abutsu-ni gathers all five together under the phrase 'her five children'.

The tenth month of Koan 2 (1279); the poem comes in the letter sent back to the house in the capital by the daughter serving at the women's palace.

It answers the detailed letter from her mother and the poem added at its end, "Kimi o koso asahi to tanome furusato ni nokoru nadeshiko shimo ni karasu na." The reply was written out fully and with much feeling.

With this answer the parting exchange closes. Abutsu-ni notes that she has written out the poems of all five children without omission, admitting it may look foolish of her but saying that to a parent's heart they were all moving; then, telling herself that such weakness will not do, she casts it off and sets out.

The reply takes up the charge laid upon her and sets her mother's mind at rest. The first line means to leave one's thoughts behind, and it speaks of the heart of the one departing. The second line gathers that lingering heart into a noun and sets it as the reason for what follows. The third line answers the old home of the sent poem, and the fourth takes over its frost unchanged. The negative conjecture in the fourth line turns the prohibition of the sent poem, do not let them wither, into a prediction that they will not, so that a command is met with a guarantee. The closing line takes up the pinks of the sent poem and gives them weight by prefixing the name of Yamato, which also calls up the way of Japanese verse, and the poem ends on the noun. She does not say that she accepts the charge; by declaring that they will not wither, she shows that she already has.

Source

Izayoi Nikki

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