花のもと露の情けはほどもあらじ
ゑいなすすめそ春の山風
ゑいなすすめそ春の山風
- Roma-ji
-
Hana no moto tsuyu no nasake wa hodo mo araji ei na susume so haru no yamakaze
- English Translation
-
Beneath the blossoms,
the kindness of dew will not
linger for long, so—
do not urge me to drink,
O mountain wind of spring.
- Meaning
- The dew-brief kindness beneath the blossoms cannot last; do not urge me to drink, O mountain wind of spring.
- Commentary
-
Book Twenty Buddhist Poems 1964
Headnote: "The Precept Against Selling Alcohol."
This is the fourth poem in the sequence on the Ten Precepts, closing that sequence. Since the fleeting kindness of dew beneath the blossoms will not last, the poet calls on the spring mountain wind not to urge him to drink. The headnote gives as its topic the Precept Against Selling Alcohol, one of the Ten Precepts.
Rebuking the spring mountain wind that lures one to the fleeting pleasures of a blossom-viewing banquet, the poem entrusts to a scene of flowers and wind the teaching that one must not press alcohol on others.
No author is named in the text; continuing from the preceding poem, this is a poem by Jakuzen Hōshi, who, whose lay name was Fujiwara no Yorinari, was a son of Fujiwara no Tametada. With his elder brothers Jakunen and Jakuchō he lived in retirement at Ōhara, and the three were called the Three Jaku of Ōhara. He was a close friend of Saigyō.
The Precept Against Selling Alcohol forbids selling alcohol and urging others to drink. In this text, one character of the headnote is written as a nonstandard glyph.
The first line, "hana no moto," means "beneath the blossoms," marking the scene of a blossom-viewing banquet.
The second line, "tsuyu no nasake wa," is kindness as fleeting as dew on the blossoms, pointing to the momentary pleasures of the banquet.
The third line, "hodo mo araji," uses the negative conjecture "ji" to declare that it will not last long. The poem breaks after it.
The fourth line, "ei na susume so," is a prohibition in the "na ... so" form: do not urge me to drink. It transposes the scripture's "selling alcohol" into pressing drink on others.
The last line, "haru no yamakaze," addresses the spring mountain wind that scatters the blossoms, and ends on a noun. The wind that scatters the flowers and makes the dew's kindness fleeting is set down also as a wind that invites drunkenness.
- Author
- Jakuzen
- Source
- Shin Kokin Wakashu
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