Yaoyorozu kamimoawareme tarachineno wagamachiento taenutamanoo

English Translation

Eight million gods,
have pity, I beg of you,
on my mother's life—
on the thread of jewels she keeps
unbroken to wait for me

Meaning

Gods in your eight million, have pity: pity the thread of her life, which my mother keeps unbroken so that she may wait for me.

Commentary

Book Two: Niijimamori

The narrative traces the rise of the warriors: the two lines of Minamoto and Taira had served in turn as guardians of the court. The Taira descended from Emperor Kammu, and after Kiyomori's house was destroyed the line of Koretoki sank wholly into the common people, so that only Taira no Shiro Tokimasa remained, in the district of Hojo in Izu. On the Minamoto side, Yoritomo, eighth in descent from Emperor Seiwa, had been exiled to Hirugashima in Izu after the Heiji disturbance; the Cloistered Emperor Go-Shirakawa, harassed by the Taira, summoned him and had him raise an army. The Taira were scattered in the autumn winds of Juei, and Yoritomo, though he stayed at Kamakura, held the realm in the palm of his hand. Going up to the capital at the beginning of the Kenkyu era he was met at the post station of Hashimoto in Totomi by courtesans and exchanged linked verse with them; made Provisional Major Counselor and Commander of the Right, he resigned the offices at once, and taking the post of chief constable of the provinces he installed his own warriors as land stewards. The narrator judges that the decline of this country began here. As he was going back east, the Yoshimizu bishop, who had long prayed for him, sent him a poem, and Yoritomo replied. In the first month of Shoji 1 Yoritomo died at fifty-three. His son Yoriie succeeded him but proved unsettled, lost the warriors' loyalty, was killed at Shuzenji, and his young son Ichiman was destroyed as well. Sanetomo then rose without hindrance in rank and office, and while worshipping at the Hachiman shrine as Minister of the Right he was cut down by Kugyo, Yoriie's son, on the twenty-seventh day of the first month of Joukyu 1. With no heir, his mother the Lady of Second Rank, Masako, served in the shogun's place, and in time the two-year-old son of Kujo Michiie was sent down to Kamakura, so that everything lay in Yoshitoki's hands. About this time the retired emperor was secretly forming a design, and those who served near him thought of nothing but bows and arrows. In the fourth month of Joukyu 3 the emperor abdicated to the four-year-old crown prince. The design gradually leaked out, and the eastern deputy Iga no Hangan Mitsusue was attacked and cut his belly. In the east, Yoshitoki sent a great host up to the capital under his brother Tokifusa and his eldest son Yasutoki. Yasutoki turned back alone on the road to ask his father what should be done if the imperial palanquin were set at the head of the enemy; Yoshitoki answered that if the sovereign came out in person they should take off their helmets, cut their bowstrings and submit, but that otherwise they should fight to the death. In the capital the bridges of Uji and Seta were broken down, rites past counting were performed, and the retired emperor went secretly to the Hie shrine, where a god possessing a child declared that because of an old grievance over the carrying of the sacred palanquin he could not take his side this time. Past the tenth day of the sixth month, with scarcely a battle, the imperial forces were beaten. After the rising, the senior retired emperor Go-Toba was moved to Oki and the new retired emperor Juntoku to Sado, and the emperor was set aside after little more than seventy days. The middle retired emperor Tsuchimikado had had no part in it, but thinking it presumptuous to remain quietly in the capital while his father was carried so far away, he asked to go down to Tosa, and was later moved to Awa. The dwelling at Oki stood on an island far from any village, with a gallery of pine pillars thatched with reeds, stripped of ornament yet made elegant in its way, looking out over a wide stretch of sea. There the retired emperor composed poems with the seasons, exchanged letters with Shichijoin and with Ietaka, and had the poems of those months gathered and sent to Shumeimon'in.
Minamoto no Yoritomo was eighth in descent from Emperor Seiwa, grandson of Tameyoshi the Rokujo Magistrate and third son of Yoshitomo, Master of the Left Horse Bureau. His wife was the daughter of Hojo no Shiro Tokimasa, and their sons were Yoriie and Sanetomo; Kugyo was Yoriie's son. Tokimasa's sons were Munetoki and Yoshitoki; Yoshitoki's brother was Tokifusa and his eldest son Yasutoki. The Lady of Second Rank, Masako, was Yoritomo's wife and the mother of Yoriie and Sanetomo. The Yoshimizu bishop Jien was a poet-monk who long held the office of Tendai abbot. Go-Toba's mother was Shichijoin, Juntoku's was Shumeimon'in, and Tsuchimikado's was Shomeimon'in. The father of the boy sent down to Kamakura was the Minister of the Left Kujo Michiie, whose wife was the daughter of Lord Kintsune; Kintsune's own wife was the daughter of the Middle Counselor Yoshiyasu of Ichijo, whose mother was Yoritomo's sister. Ietaka of the second rank was among those called to compile the Shinkokinshu and was employed intimately by the retired emperor in the way of poetry. Iga no Hangan Mitsusue was in the capital as the deputy of the east.
On an evening when he sat gazing in unspeakable dejection, a letter came from the capital. Shichijoin had written that with a life uncertain past tomorrow she longed to see him once more, and that as things stood she could not even cross the mountain road of death.
This poem stands directly after "Tarachineno kieyaradematsu tsuyunomio kazeyorisakini ikadetowamashi", composed as he pressed the letter to his face. No fresh attribution is given for it. Shichijoin was his mother, daughter of Nobutaka, Master of the Office of Palace Repairs.
Afterwards it is said that the sorrowful letters reaching him from every quarter, as though tied to the wings of the first wild geese, drew tears from him past bearing, and the narrative turns to the exchange with Ietaka of the second rank.

The first line means a number beyond counting and attaches to the gods of the second, where the imperative begs their pity; the added particle implies that since human power can do nothing, even the gods are appealed to. The third line, as in the previous poem, is the pillow word for a mother standing for the mother herself. The fourth line says that she means to hold on until she can wait for him, with an auxiliary of will. The close rests on a noun: the thread of jewels, an old figure for life, which she keeps unbroken. Where the previous poem likened her to dew, this replaces the figure with the thread, setting side by side two images of fragility, dew about to vanish and a cord about to snap. And where the earlier poem was an impossible wish to go to her himself, this takes the form of prayer, handing over to another power what his own cannot reach; the two are placed in the order in which grief deepens.

Author

Go-Toba In

Source

Masukagami

Other