Taezu yuku waga nakagawa no mizu masari ochi naru hito zo koishikarikeru

English Translation

My Nakagawa,
my mid-river that flows on
without a break, is
high with rain; and the one who
is far off is dear to me.

Meaning

My Nakagawa, my mid-river that flows on without a break, runs high with rain; and the one who is far off is dear to me.

Commentary

94 The Exchange on the Nakagawa in Flood

In the fifth month the Master of the Right Stables sent for Michitsuna; but as he was about to go the rain came down hard and did not let up all night, so that he could not. He therefore sent a poem, saying that a letter at least might pass between them, and the Master of the Right Stables answered. Afterward, when the rain had stopped, he came to the author and spoke of the marriage; and she tore off part of a letter of Kaneie's, in which he gave his reasons why pressing him would be difficult, and showed it to him.
The author was a daughter of Fujiwara no Tomoyasu. Michitsuna was her son. The Master of the Right Stables was Kaneie's younger brother; the text gives only his office and no name. The Nakagawa is Hirohata Nakagawa, where the author had moved two years before, and also the name of the stream that ran through her grounds and past them.
It is the fifth month of the second year of Tenen, and the place is the author's house at Hirohata Nakagawa.
The Master of the Right Stables had sent for him, but as Michitsuna was about to go the rain came down hard and did not stop all night, so that he could not; and he sent this poem, saying that a letter at least might pass.
The Master of the Right Stables answered with "Awanu se o koishi to omowaba omou dochi hemu nakagawa ni ware o sumase yo."

The opening means flowing without interval, giving the actual sight of a stream swollen with rain. The second names Hirohata Nakagawa, where the house stood, and at the same time the relation between two people, and on it the poem turns. Using a place name for a human bond is exactly what his mother did at the time of the move, in "Nagarete no toko to tanomite koshikadomo waga nakagawa wa asenikerashi mo"; there the river had run shallow, and here it runs high, so that the same name serves both for a bond worn thin and for the water that keeps two people apart. The third names the rising of the water, which is what blocks his way. The fourth names the one far off, that is, the man who had sent for him. The close is bound by an emphatic particle and states the longing. He lays the blame for not coming on the water; but since the river's name means the bond itself, the suggestion arises that what separates them is not the water but the relation.

Author

Fujiwara no Michitsuna

Source

Kagero Nikki

Other