Kaketekoso omowazarishika konoyonite shibashimokimini wakarubeshitowa

English Translation

Never, not at all,
did I think that such a thing
could come to pass—that
here in this world, even for
a short while, I must leave you

Meaning

It never once crossed my mind that in this world I should be parted from you, even for a little while.

Commentary

Section 18: The Father Appointed Governor of Hitachi

While the author passed her days on the hopeless expectation that if her father came into some position of consequence her own standing would rise with it, he was at last appointed governor of a province far off in the east.
He lamented night and day. For years, he said, he had thought that if he were given a province near the capital he would first make much of her to his heart's content, take her down with him, show her the sea and the hills, and, that aside, treat her with more honour than himself. His luck and hers from a former life being poor, it had come at last to a province as distant as this. Even when he took her east as a child, he had thought that if his own health failed even a little he would be leaving her stranded in that country. For all the strangeness of the provinces, he could have managed well enough alone; it was dragging a whole household with him, unable to say what he wished or do what he wished, that had worn at him. Now, with her grown, to take her down and then have his own life fail—drifting in the capital is common enough, but to be left adrift as a countrywoman in the east would be too wretched. Leaving her in the capital, there were no relatives who would take her in. Yet a province hardly come by could not be declined. So he must leave her behind, and this might be their parting for good; nor could he see his way to settling her future first and then going. To hear him say this made her forget all thought of blossom and maples for grief, but there was nothing to be done.
On the thirteenth day of the seventh month he went down. From five days before, meeting only made things worse, and he did not come to her room. On the day itself the house was in an uproar; when the hour came, he raised her blind for the last time, they looked at each other and let the tears fall, and he went straight out. Watching him go, her sight went dark and she fell forward where she was. A manservant who was to stay in the capital saw him part of the way and came back with a poem written on a sheet of pocket paper, which she could not see for tears. In easier times she would have turned over even a clumsy verse at length; unable to think what to say, she sent an answer.
Callers grew fewer still, and she sat in low spirits wondering all day where he might be by now. Knowing the road herself, her longing and loneliness had no limit, and from morning to night she passed the time gazing at the eastern ridgeline.

The author is known only as the daughter of Sugawara no Takasue. Her father was appointed governor of Hitachi in Chōgen 5 (1032) and went down alone. Her mother was a daughter of Fujiwara no Tomoyasu and a younger half-sister of the author of the Kagerō Nikki. Hitachi lies at the far eastern end of the Tōkaidō, further still than the Kazusa of her childhood.

The thirteenth day of the seventh month, Chōgen 5 (1032), the day of the father's departure; at the house in the capital.

The manservant who came back from seeing him off brought pocket paper on which was written "Omoukoto kokoronikanau minariseba akinowakareo fukakushiramashi," and this answers it.

With this exchange the departure scene closes, and the author passes her days in a house from which callers have gone, gazing at the eastern ridgeline from morning to night. The letters from the province come in the following section.

Kakete in the first line, with a negative below it, means "not in the least." Koso is emphatic, bound to shika, the perfective-conditional of the past auxiliary ki. Kono yo nite is in this world, while one is alive. In the fourth line shibashi is a short while and mo strengthens it: even for a short while. In the close beshi is the auxiliary of what must or will be, and to wa reaches back to omowazarishika, so that the order of the sentence is reversed. Where the father's poem used the seasonal phrase aki no wakare and spoke of having no room to savour a parting, this one uses no seasonal language at all and says only wakaru, to be parted. The prose says she wrote without being able to think what to say, and the poem is indeed without artifice, which is what carries the pressure of the moment. Set beside "Omoukoto kokoronikanau minariseba akinowakareo fukakushiramashi," the difference stands out between a father who tries to fit the parting into the shape of a poem and a daughter for whom it will not fit.

Author

Sugawara no Takasue no Musume

Source

Sarashina Nikki

Other