Mono omoi no fukasa kurabe ni kite mireba natsu no shigeri mo mono naranaku ni

English Translation

I came here to match
the depth of my own brooding
against it — and see:
even the summer's thickest
growth is nothing beside it.

Meaning

I came to match the depth of my own brooding against it; and see — even the summer's thickest growth is nothing beside it.

Commentary

54 The Retreat at Narutaki

On the fourth of the sixth month, setting out before Kaneie's period of abstinence was over, she went to the temple at Narutaki in the western hills and shut herself up there. Kaneie came to fetch her and she would not go; letters passed, and life at the mountain temple went on. Her sister visited, Kaneie's messenger came, she hardened a sorrowful resolve, and another letter came from him. Letters of inquiry arrived one after another, and though she answered them the next day, the time went by while she turned over such thoughts as that she did not mean to stay shut up forever. She put that state of mind into a poem and sent it to one who had written. An answer came. Then, to the gentlewomen on night duty, someone who had once served in that office sent a poem, saying that they too must be attending their mistress with heavy hearts, and that there is a poem about how high and low alike have their risings and fallings. Hearing of it from the woman, the author told her to answer quickly, and she replied that seeing their mistress holding back her tears made them all wretched. Later a relative came to call, and the next day sent the things needed for a long stay away from home, adding that it must have been hard to come all that way to a mountain temple, with two poems. The author wrote back with great care and returned two poems of her own. Afterward letters passed with Tōshi, and a poem came also from an ascetic of the temple who had crossed the Ōmine range from Mitake to Kumano. In time Michitaka called, her father Tomoyasu came for her, and at last she came down from the mountain when Kaneie came to fetch her.
The author was a daughter of Fujiwara no Tomoyasu. Kaneie was the third son of Fujiwara no Morosuke and would rise to be regent and chancellor. Narutaki is a place in the western hills of the capital, where the temple stood. The one who sent the letter of inquiry, the former attendant on night duty, the gentlewoman, the relative and the ascetic are none of them named in the text.
It is the sixth month of the second year of Tenroku, and the place is the mountain temple at Narutaki.
It is the first of the two poems she returned, writing with great care, in answer to the two the relative had sent with the supplies.
The second is "Mi hitotsu no kaku naru taki o tazunureba sara ni kaeranu mizu mo sumikeri." Afterward letters pass with Tōshi, and a poem comes also from an ascetic of the temple.

She takes back the other's summer grasses and grass-grown hillside. The first two lines mean that she came in order to compare depths, recasting the purpose of the journey. Where the other had spoken of coming all the way to a hillside thick with summer grass, she reads that as a coming to measure depth. The third means: and having come and looked. The fourth names the summer's growth, taking over the grasses of the other poem. The close means that it is not worth counting: even the depth of the mountain's growth does not come up to the depth of her brooding. To a message concerned with the depth of the hills, she answers that the depth of the heart is greater — accepting the consolation and offering back a grief that exceeds it. Bringing mountain and heart under a single measure by the one word for depth carries straight on into the depth of the water in the poem that follows.

Author

The Mother of Fujiwara no Michitsuna

Source

Kagero Nikki

Other