Kawabuneno sashiteizukuka waganaranu tabitowaiwaji yadotosadamen

English Translation

The river boat poles
onward—but where is it bound?
This is not a place
that is nothing of mine: I will not
call it travel, but my home

Meaning

Where is the river boat poling to? This place is not foreign to me. I will not call it travel; I shall make it my home.

Commentary

Book Six: Kemuri no Suezue

About the twentieth day of the eleventh month of Hoji 2 the retired emperor went to Uji to view the autumn leaves. The nobles and courtiers had long been preparing hunting robes of their own choosing, in the deep and pale shades of chrysanthemum and maple, embroidered and figured, brocade and damask. He set out at first light on the twenty-first, boarded a boat prepared on the eastern bank of the Uji river, and landed at the fishing pavilion of the Byodoin. Sutras were chanted in the main hall, and he went through the Amida hall, the sutra repository and the penance hall. Watchfires were lit white on both banks and cormorant fishers were called, and the trays were brought in. Toward dusk the next day he viewed Maki island, Ume island and Tachibana no Kojima; music began from instruments set in the boat, so fine that one thought even the depths of the water might listen, and the distant white waves that the ascetic prince of the Uji chapters spoke of seemed to add their own note. On the twenty-third, the day of return, gifts were presented—calligraphic models, a wagon, two horses—and the retired emperor gave a horse to his host. The Minister of the Left received the first rank and danced his thanks. While he was away a fire broke out at Nijo Aburanokoji; since it lay within the wall of the Kan'in palace the imperial kitchen burned, and the cauldron handed down from the age of the gods was damaged, which everyone thought dreadful. There had once been three such cauldrons, called Hirano, Imibi and Niwabi; two were lost about the Eikan years in Enyu's reign, and when this befell the one remaining, the Bureau of Shrines was consulted and old precedents examined. On the twenty-fifth of the twelfth month came the first reading of the young prince born to the lady of third rank, later Prince Munetaka, then seven years old. The year turned to Hoji 3. At the new year salutations there was a dispute, argued long afterwards, over where the nobles should stand. On the fourth came the first progress to Shomeimon'in, and then Omiya-in's first visit to the palace. The empress was the retired emperor's elder sister, who had been called his foster mother while he reigned, and was later known as Senkamon'in. The retired emperor's son of thirteen, borne by the daughter of the Middle Captain Kinmune, became a disciple of the cloistered prince of Emmanin on the twenty-eighth of the first month, took the tonsure that night and was named Enjo. On the night of the first of the second month fire broke out from the Nijo-side wing of the Kan'in palace and the residence burned; the emperor left in haste through the gate with only the regalia. The palace had burned more than twenty times since Tentoku 4, and there had been no such fire for forty-four years since Jogen; coming after the damage to the cauldron the year before, it dismayed the retired emperor. He moved close enough to the retired emperor's residence to cross on foot. A red plum at the corner of the northern wing was blooming beautifully and could be seen from the retired emperor's rooms, so he had a poem written on elegant thin paper and tied to that plum. Ben no Naishi was to have made the reply, but it is said that the minister of Imadegawa sent one instead, and the narrator regrets having forgotten it. The era was changed to Kencho on the eighteenth of the third month because of the disorder, but the fires did not stop: on the twenty-third a fire from Anekoji Muromachi burned more than a hundred blocks, reached the hall of the Rengeoin in the afternoon, and the thousand Kannon of the thirty-three bays perished in a single blaze. Fires followed at Sorinji, Okazaki and Nakamikado, burning day after day until the end of the month, and two-thirds of the capital was destroyed. Seven diviners were summoned and told of a grave portent, and rites were begun. Since his abdication the retired emperor had made it his rule each spring to seclude himself seven days at Iwashimizu and offer the five great sutras, then go on to Kamo, Hirano and Kitano, and to visit Seiryoji in Saga, Horinji and Uzumasa; people said his reverence for gods and buddhas had no precedent past or future. The Toba villa, lately much decayed and its pond choked with weeds, was thoroughly repaired, and at his first visit poems were composed on the topic of the pines by the pond, with a preface written by the chancellor. He also went often to the chancellor's villa at Suita in Tsu. The house faced the river, so that in deep autumn under a full moon the rice in the fields, the belling of stags, the fulling blocks, the wind on the ridge and the crickets in the meadows gathered together; cormorant boats were sent out and he watched the watchfires on the water with delight. During a stay there he called for sets of ten poems, and at his own the host declared it the honour of the house. The retired emperor was not yet thirty, the emperor was a child and the regent young, so they spent their days among the ladies at games of go stones, shell matching, ball and rhyme capping. Court ceremonies were mimicked by the ladies for his amusement; the chancellor had small batons made for them. A lady of third rank was made chancellor, and the others were assigned men's offices; when Chunagon no Naishi was assigned to the Provisional Major Counselor Sanekatsu she withdrew to her room protesting that she could never manage the stockings, and the emperor laughed aloud. An exchange of poems followed. On the fifth of the fifth month, among the sweet-flag ornaments and medicine balls sent from many quarters, the Major Counselor Kinchika of Sanjo sent mugwort with the word for deep tied into it, and an exchange followed with Ben no Naishi. Visiting Tennoji, the retired emperor also went to Sumiyoshi; Omiya-in accompanied him, and the sleeves showing from the carriages were like the blossoms of spring and the leaves of autumn set out together. Many poems were composed on the veranda of the fishing pavilion. The retired emperor's eldest son, borne by the woman who had served Shijoin as Hyoe no Naishi, daughter of Taira no Munenori, had been overshadowed since the reigning emperor's birth; on the eighth of the first month of Kencho 4 he came of age before the retired emperor, was given the third rank and called Prince Munetaka, Minister of Central Affairs, at eleven. On the nineteenth of the second month he received the shogunal edict and left the capital, and the retired emperor watched him go from a carriage drawn up secretly near Awataguchi. On the thirteenth of the first month of Kencho 5 the emperor came of age at eleven; his personal name was Hisahito. About the tenth of the tenth month he made a filial visit to the retired emperor at the Toba villa, and when the retired empress too was greeted, the chancellor's tears of joy were almost unseemly. Two boats fitted out in Chinese style were rowed up on the pond. On a pilgrimage to Kumano about that time, carriages were not to be drawn up, yet Omiya-in alone watched from a single carriage without the usual display, and Ben no Naishi composed a poem. When the party reached the main shrine and crossed by river boat toward the new shrine, the boats crowded the water so thickly that the sight was strange to him, and the retired emperor composed a poem.
The retired emperor is Go-Saga, at this time not yet thirty. The chancellor is Saneuji of Saionji, father of Omiya-in and the retired emperor's father-in-law. Omiya-in was Saneuji's daughter and the mother of the emperor, the later Go-Fukakusa. The empress was the retired emperor's elder sister, later called Senkamon'in. The regent was Lord Kanetsune of Okanoya, the Minister of the Left Kanehira, the Inner Minister Sanemoto. The son who became a disciple at Emmanin was borne by the daughter of the Middle Captain Kinmune and was named Enjo. Prince Munetaka was the retired emperor's eldest son, borne by the woman who had served Shijoin as Hyoe no Naishi, daughter of Taira no Munenori; his mother is called the lady of third rank, and he went east as shogun. Dainagon no Naishi was the daughter of Tameie, Minister of Popular Affairs, and Azechi no Naishi the daughter of Takahira. Ben no Naishi and Shosho no Naishi were daughters of Lord Nobuzane and sisters. The Major Counselor Kinchika of Sanjo served close to the retired emperor.
The retired emperor went often to the chancellor's villa at Suita in the province of Tsu, where entertainments of every kind were arranged and his host took endless pains over how to receive him.
The house faced the river, so that in deep autumn under a full moon it was especially fine: the rice in the fields bending in the wind, the belling of stags, the sound of fulling blocks, the wind on the ridge and the crickets in the meadows all gathered there. Cormorant boats were sent out, and he watched with delight the surface of the river lit by their fires. During a stay of several days he called for sets of ten poems, and composed this himself on that occasion.
When it was read aloud the host was greatly pleased and declared that the honour of the house lay in that day; all who heard it thought so too and felt proud.

The first line sets a boat on the river before him, and in the second the verb means both to pole a boat and to make for a destination, so the poem asks where it is bound. To this point it is river scenery. The third line denies that the place is nothing of his, taking up what precedes. In the fourth the negative auxiliary of will declares that he will not call this a lodging on a journey, and the close, with an auxiliary of will, resolves to make it his home. Beginning from a question about where a boat is going, the poem turns that question toward where the speaker himself belongs, and by calling another man's villa his own home it pays the host the highest possible compliment. That is why the host declared it the honour of the house: here a single poem serves as more than a gift. To say that one will not call a stay a journey is the conventional way of acknowledging a place as a second home, and, as with the exchange at the Saionji in the fifth book, the relation continues in which the retired emperor repays the Saionji family's efforts in words.

Author

Go-Saga In

Source

Masukagami

Other