柴の戸に入り日の影はさしながら
いかに時雨るる山辺なるらん
いかに時雨るる山辺なるらん
- Roma-ji
-
Shiba no to ni irihi no kage wa sashinagara ika ni shigururu yamabe naruran
- English Translation
-
On the brushwood door
the light of the setting sun
still falls, and yet
why do the winter showers fall
on this mountainside?
- Meaning
- The light of the setting sun still falls upon my brushwood door—so why is it that winter showers are falling here on the mountainside?
- Commentary
-
Book Six Winter Poems 572
Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Topic unknown."
This is the third poem of the winter-showers sequence. The speaker wonders why the showers fall even though the setting sun still shines on the brushwood door. The headnote continues from the preceding poem with no topic given, and the circumstances of composition are not recorded.
The author, "Kiyosuke Ason," is Fujiwara no Kiyosuke. A son of the Master of the Western Capital Office Fujiwara no Akisuke, he was a poet of the Rokujō Fujiwara house and wrote the poetic treatises Fukuro Zōshi and Ōgishō.
The scene is early winter with the setting sun shining, and the place is a mountainside where a dwelling with a brushwood door stands.
The direct occasion is not recorded.
The first line, "shiba no to ni," means "on the humble door of woven brushwood," indicating a mountain dwelling.
The second line, "irihi no kage wa," means "the light of the sinking sun," with "kage" meaning light.
In the third line, "sashinagara," "nagara" is concessive: "though it shines."
The fourth line, "ika ni shigururu," means "why do the showers fall?" The nature of winter showers, which fall and pass even in clear spells, is caught as a wonder: rain falling while the sun shines.
The last line, "yamabe naruran," means "is it this mountainside?" with "ran" as an auxiliary conjecturing a cause, answering "ika ni" in the fourth line. Following 570 in this book, which sang of a cleared peak and the first shower, the pairing of clear weather and showers is sung again. The next poem, 573, shares the words "shiba no to" and "shigururu" and sings of showers that fall even after the clouds have cleared.
- Author
- Fujiwara no Kiyosuke
- Source
- Shin Kokin Wakashu
- Other
-
- Over the high peak where I wait for the moon, the clouds have cleared away; surely it has a heart, this first winter shower
- In the Godless Month the leaves of all the trees have scattered, every one, and in the garden now the sound of wind is heard
- Clouds have cleared, and still winter showers fall at the brushwood door— dew beneath the pines swept down by mountain wind
- In the Godless Month the winter showers must be falling; on Mount Saho the masaki vine deepens in its color