Omoishiru hitonimisebaya yamazatono akinoyofukaki ariakenotsuki

English Translation

Would I could show this
to someone who understands—
this mountain village,
the autumn night grown so deep,
and the moon left in the sky

Meaning

How I would like to show this to someone who understands such things—the late-night moon of autumn, still in the sky over this mountain village.

Commentary

Section 16: Back to the Capital from the Eastern Hills

In the eighth month, when the moon of past the twentieth stood beautiful toward dawn, with the hills dark on one side and the sound of the waterfall like nothing else, the author gazed and gazed at it and made a poem.
Setting out at last from the Eastern Hills for the capital, she found that the fields which had shown nothing but water when she came had all been reaped, and the change drew another poem.
Toward the end of the tenth month she came back for a brief look. The leaves that had grown thick and dark had scattered without one left, the whole prospect opened out and full of feeling, and the stream that had run so pleasantly was buried under leaves with only its channel showing. She made a poem on that.
She had told a nun living there that if she lived until spring she would certainly come again, and asked to be sent word as soon as the blossom was at its height; but the year turned and no message came, and by past the tenth of the third month she sent a poem to prompt her.
Having moved to another household, near the time of the moon, in a room close by the bamboo, she was woken again and again by the sound of the wind and could not settle to sleep, and composed another poem.
Around autumn she left that house for another, and sent a poem to the host of the place where she had been staying.

The author is known only as the daughter of Sugawara no Takasue. Of the nun in the Eastern Hills and of the host of the lodging, the text gives neither name nor station. A tabi naru tokoro is a stay at a house other than one's own, as when avoiding an unlucky direction.

Toward dawn, past the twentieth of the eighth month, Manju 2 (1025), at the house in the Eastern Hills.

The moon of past the twentieth stayed in the sky until near daybreak, the hills lay dark, and the waterfall sounded with a depth like nothing else. Gazing at it is what drew the poem.

It is a solitary poem, and no reply is recorded. After it the household leaves the Eastern Hills for the capital.

Omoi shiru, "one who knows what such things mean," modifies hito in the second line, where baya is a particle of desire: how I should like to show it. Yamazato no fixes the place, aki no yo fukaki is the night grown fully deep, and the poem ends on a noun, the moon that lingers after daybreak, offering the scene as it stands. The complaint of having no one to share it with is the same shape as "Tarenimise tarenikikasemu yamazatono konoakatsukimo ochikaerunemo" in the previous section, but where that one lamented that there was no one at all, this one sets a condition—omoi shiru hito—and asks not for anyone but for someone who would understand. Placed last among the days in the Eastern Hills, the narrowing shows that the author has become certain of the worth of what she has been looking at.

Author

Sugawara no Takasue no Musume

Source

Sarashina Nikki

Other