Koreodani katamitoomouni miyakoniwa hagaeyashitsuru shiishibanosode

English Translation

Even this alone
I hold as his memory
yet in the city
have they changed their leaves already
these sleeves of oak-dyed mourning

Meaning

Even this I keep as a memento of him — yet in the capital, have the sleeves of the mourning robe already changed their leaves?

Commentary

138 The Year the Mourning for Retired Emperor En'yū Ended

In the year the mourning for Retired Emperor En'yū came to an end, everyone put off their mourning robes, and from the Emperor down people were recalling his lifetime with feeling. On a day of heavy rain, a large child dressed like a bagworm came to the apartments of the Lady of the Third Rank with a formal letter tied to a white stick, saying he wished to deliver it. The attendant said that whoever it was from, today and tomorrow were days of ritual seclusion and the shutters would not be raised, and took it in over the closed lower half. The lady heard of it but said she would not look at anything during her seclusion, and had it stuck above the shutter.

The next morning she washed her hands, called for what she took to be yesterday's record of sutras read, bowed over it and opened it — to find thick walnut-coloured paper. Puzzled, she opened it further, and there in a heavy, priestly hand was this poem.

The Lady of the Third Rank was wet nurse to Emperor Ichijō, whose father was Retired Emperor En'yū. The Major Counsellor is Fujiwara no Tamemitsu, who had served as head of the Retired Emperor's household office. The Archbishop of Ninnaji is also named among her guesses.

The time is the year after the first anniversary, from a day of heavy rain to the following morning; the place is the lady's apartments.

The immediate occasion is her opening, in the middle of her seclusion, a letter disguised as a record of sutras. Its content mocks, from the position of one still in mourning, those at court who have already changed their robes.

She was appalled: what a spiteful thing, who could have done it? The Archbishop of Ninnaji, perhaps — but surely he would never say such a thing; the Major Counsellor had been head of the Retired Emperor's office, so it must be his doing. Longing to tell the Emperor and the Empress at once, she nonetheless made herself sit out the seclusion, which was said to be dangerous to break, and the next morning had a reply left at the Major Counsellor's, whereupon an answer came back immediately. Carrying both, she hurried to court and told the story before the Emperor himself. Who actually sent the letter remains a matter of interpretation.

The first line uses a particle of minimum degree: even this, at least, when everything else is gone. In the second, a concessive turn — I hold it as his memory, and yet.

The fourth line carries the poem. The phrase for a tree exchanging its leaves is laid over the changing of robes, and an interrogative particle binds the verb into its attributive form. By transferring a human act — putting off mourning — into the natural business of a tree renewing its foliage, the reproach is never spoken outright.

The close rests on a noun: sleeves dyed the blackish colour taken from oak bark, the colour of mourning. Because that colour name contains a tree, it forms an associated pair with the changing of leaves in the line before, and tree and garment overlap within a single word. Ending on a concrete garment leaves the feeling suspended while setting, at the very last, those still in mourning against those who have changed. Together with the priestly hand and the disguise as a temple document, the elaborateness of the thing is what drives the whole second half of the section, which turns entirely on guessing at the sender.

Source

Makura no Soshi

Other