Kimi o nomi tanomu tabi naru kokoro ni wa yukusue tōku omōyuru kana

English Translation

Setting out with none
but you to rely upon,
my heart looks ahead
and what is yet to come seems
far, and further still, from here.

Meaning

Setting out with no one but you to rely on, my heart finds the road ahead — and her future — stretching far away.

Commentary

5 Tomoyasu's Departure as Governor of Mutsu

Tomoyasu, the father on whom the author relied, was to set out for Mutsu. The season was one that touches the heart, and she and Kaneie were not yet what could be called familiar with one another; his visits were rare. Her helplessness was beyond comparison. On the day of departure even her father could not hold back his tears, and she who remained was sadder still beyond expression. He could not bring himself to leave until they told him the hour had passed, and then he rolled a letter into the inkstone case, pressed it in, and went out weeping. For some while she had no heart to look at it, but when everyone had gone she steadied herself and opened it, and found a poem written there. She thought it must be meant for the eyes of the one who ought to see it, and, overcome, she left it where it lay. Kaneie came at last, and seeing her sunk in thought without meeting his eyes, spoke to her, then found the letter in the inkstone case and composed his reply. In the days that followed, whenever she thought of her father under a traveller's sky, Kaneie's heart did not seem greatly to be relied upon.
Fujiwara no Tomoyasu was the author's father, a man of the provincial governor class, who in this year went down to Mutsu as its governor. Kaneie was the third son of Fujiwara no Morosuke and at this time Assistant Commander of the Right Guards; he would rise to be regent and chancellor. The author was Tomoyasu's daughter, married to Kaneie not long before.
It is late autumn in the eighth year of Tenryaku, a season that touches the heart, and the place is the author's dwelling.
Unable to finish his farewell, her father rolled a letter into the inkstone case and left it behind. This is the poem it contained.
She thought it was meant to be shown to the proper person, and, overcome, left it as it lay. Kaneie found it when he came, and answered with "Ware o nomi tanomu to ieba yukusue no matsu no chiyo o mo kimi koso wa mime."

The person addressed in the opening is Kaneie, and the line implies that his daughter has no one else to depend upon. The second line means to set out relying upon another, and the verb of relying is the hinge of the poem, taken up unchanged in the reply. The third line fixes the subject as the father's own heart, and the fourth carries it forward to what is still to come. That phrase means both his daughter's future and the road stretching ahead to Mutsu, so that the word for distance governs them both. The close means that it comes to seem so of itself, and the final particle of feeling gathers up the helplessness of the parting. He never says outright that he is entrusting her to Kaneie; he leaves behind only his anxiety, and in that lies everything he could not bring himself to say at the time.

Author

Fujiwara no Tomoyasu

Source

Kagero Nikki

Other