故郷の今日の面影誘ひ来と
月にぞ契る小夜の中山
月にぞ契る小夜の中山
- Roma-ji
-
Furusato no kyō no omokage sasoikoto tsuki ni zo chigiru sayo no nakayama
- English Translation
-
From my old home, bring
the face of the one there today,
come, lead it to me,
so I bid the moon and pledge
at Sayo-no-Nakayama.
- Meaning
- Bring me the face of the one at home as she is today, lead it here to me: so I pledge with the moon at Sayo-no-Nakayama.
- Commentary
-
Book Ten Travel Poems 940
Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "When he presented a fifty-poem sequence."
This is the eleventh of a sequence of poems on the moon seen on a journey. At Sayo-no-Nakayama the speaker makes a pledge with the moon, asking it to bring him the face of the one at home as she is today, longing for home from the mountains of the road. According to the headnote, it was composed when he presented a fifty-poem sequence.
The author, Fujiwara no Masatsune, was a poet of the early Kamakura period. One of the compilers of the Shin Kokin Wakashū, he founded the Asukai house and was also a master of kemari football.
The scene is a night on a journey, at Sayo-no-Nakayama in Tōtōmi Province.
The direct occasion is the presentation of fifty-poem sequences to Retired Emperor Go-Toba.
The first line, "furusato no," means "of my old home." Following "furusato no hito" in 938, it sings of someone left at home.
The second line, "kyō no omokage," means "her face as it is today." It thinks of the figure of the one at home on this very day, far away.
The third line, "sasoikoto," means "lead it here to me." These are the words asking the moon, which shines over the sky of home too, to bring her image along.
The fourth line, "tsuki ni zo chigiru," means "I pledge with the moon." The particle "zo" is answered by the attributive "chigiru." Where "chigiri okiteshi" in 938 is a promise made with the one at home, here the pledge is made with the moon.
The last line, "sayo no nakayama," is a pass in Tōtōmi Province, a famous place known as a hard stretch of the Tōkaidō. It ends on a noun, giving the place last. Where 907 thinks at the same pass of ending life "mienu kumoi ni," this poem entrusts the image of home to the moon at the same place, so that one famous place carries both the anxiety of travel and longing for home.
- Author
- Fujiwara no Masatsune
- Source
- Shin Kokin Wakashu
- Other
-
- "When you see the moon"— so we promised as we parted; back in my old home, might that one tonight as well be wetting sleeves with tears?
- When the day has dawned, is that the mountain peak I must cross again— there where the passing moon goes, the white clouds that lie ahead?
- "I will not forget"— so we pledged as I set out, and my face, I think, must surely be seen there now in the moon above my home.
- On the eastern road, how I gazed deep in the night— tell them this, I pray, moonlight hanging on the hills around the capital.