Toyama dani kakarikeru o to shirakumo no fukaki kokoro wa shiru mo shiranu mo

English Translation

Even the near hills,
I thought, had cloud lying on them —
and as for the deep
heart of the white cloud, both those
who know and those who do not.

Meaning

Even the near hills, I thought, had cloud lying on them; and as for the deep heart of the white cloud — those who know it, and those who do not.

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.
After the exchange of letters with Tōshi, an ascetic of that temple, who had crossed the Ōmine range from Mitake to Kumano, addressed this poem to the author.
With it the exchanges of the Narutaki retreat come to an end. In time Michitaka calls, her father Tomoyasu comes for her, and at last she comes down when Kaneie arrives to fetch her.

The opening names the low hills near human settlement, as against the deep mountains. The second means that even these had cloud upon them, its particle marking the least case: if the shallow hills are hidden by cloud, how much deeper must the far ones be. The third names white cloud, the cloud that lies on deep mountains, and introduces the word for depth in the fourth. The deep heart joins the depth of a cloud-covered mountain to the depth of a human mind, and on it the poem turns. The close sets side by side those who know and those who do not, and ends there with the nouns standing. That the words come from an ascetic who had crossed the Ōmine range from Mitake to Kumano, a man who knows deep mountains at first hand, gives them their weight: to those who know the depth of mountains and to those who do not alike, the depth of her heart is not to be measured. He neither asks the reason for her retreat nor offers comfort, but hands her the single word for depth — a properly restrained manner for a monk. The base text is disturbed, and the reading of the second line is not settled.

Source

Kagero Nikki

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