Akioikani omoiizuramu fuyufukami arashinimadou oginokarehawa

English Translation

How must it recall
the autumn, remembering—
now that winter's deep,
that withered leaf of the reed
torn and tossed about by storms

Meaning

How must it be remembering the autumn—that withered reed leaf, tossed and broken by the storm, now that the winter has grown deep?

Commentary

Section 19: Retreat at Uzumasa; a Letter from the Father

Around the eighth month, on her way to a retreat at Uzumasa by the First Avenue, the author passed two men's carriages drawn up at the roadside, evidently waiting for someone who was to go on with them. As she went by, a man got up like an escort was sent over to say that he saw her going out to view the flowers. Since her companion said it would be graceless not to answer so elegant a sally, she had only an upper verse sent back, and went on her way.
Through the seven days of her retreat her mind was on nothing but her father in the east; she managed, barely, to leave off the idle imaginings her tales had bred in her, and prayed that she might be brought safely together with him again. Surely the Buddha heard so pitiable a prayer.
In winter, on a night after rain had fallen all day, a wind that sweeps the clouds away blew hard, the sky cleared, the moon came out very bright, and the reeds near the eaves were battered by the wind and broke and scattered so pitifully that she made a poem.
A messenger came from the east. Her father wrote that while making the round of the shrines that a governor performs on taking up his post, he had come upon a wide field with water running prettily through it and a stand of trees; thinking what a fine place it was and how sorry he was that he could not show it to her, he asked what it was called, and was told it was the Grove of Longing for a Child. The name went to his heart so painfully that he got down from his horse and sat gazing there for two hours; and he set down a poem. What it was like to read this needs no saying. The author answered with a poem of her own.

The author is known only as the daughter of Sugawara no Takasue. Her father was appointed governor of Hitachi in Chōgen 5 (1032) and wrote to her from his province. Of the owner of the carriage and his messenger the text gives neither name nor station. Uzumasa is the Kōryūji in the capital, a well-known place of retreat. The shrine circuit is the round of the province's shrines that a governor makes on first taking office.

Winter of the year her father went east; at the house in the capital.

On a night after a whole day of rain, a wind that clears the clouds blew hard, the sky opened, the moon came out very bright, and the reeds near the eaves were beaten and broken by the wind. Seeing that is what drew the poem.

It is a solitary poem, and no reply is recorded. Immediately afterwards the letter arrives from the east and she reads "Todomeokite wagagotomonoya omoikemu mirunikanashiki koshinobinomori."

Aki o ika ni runs a syllable long and puts the question: in what way, the autumn? In the second line ramu is the auxiliary of present conjecture—it must be remembering now. Fuyu fukami attaches mi to the stem of the adjective fukashi to give a cause: because the winter is deep. Arashi ni madou is to be thrown into disorder by a hard wind. The poem ends on a noun, and the order is inverted, so that the subject of the question asked in the first line is not disclosed until the last. The reed that grew green and swayed in autumn is now a dry leaf broken by storms, and in it lie both the father gone east and the daughter left in the capital. Their parting was in the seventh month, an autumn parting. It is that same autumn her father named in "Omoukoto kokoronikanau minariseba akinowakareo fukakushiramashi" in the previous section, and this poem looks back at it from the far side of winter, so that the two are joined by a season word.

Author

Sugawara no Takasue no Musume

Source

Sarashina Nikki

Other