矢形尾の真白の鷹を引き据ゑて
宇陀の鳥立ちを狩り暮らしつる
宇陀の鳥立ちを狩り暮らしつる
- Roma-ji
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Yakatao no mashiro no taka o hikisuete Uda no todachi o karikurashitsuru
- English Translation
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With my pure white hawk,
its tail barred like arrow plumes,
held fast upon my fist,
all the day long at Uda's coverts
I have hunted till the dusk
- Meaning
- With my pure white hawk, its tail barred like arrow feathers, held on my fist, I spent the whole day hunting in the coverts of Uda.
- Commentary
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Book Six Winter Poems 421
Headnote: "Composed on the topic 'Falconry' when a hundred-poem sequence was presented in the reign of Emperor Horikawa"
Composed on the topic of falconry for a hundred-poem sequence presented in the reign of Emperor Horikawa. With a pure white hawk, its tail barred like arrow feathers, held on his fist, the poet says, he spent the day until dusk hunting in the coverts of Uda. He depicts a bold and bright scene of falconry, spending a whole winter day on the hunting ground with a white hawk.
The author, "Fujiwara no Nakazane Ason," was the son of Fujiwara no Yoshinari. A poet of the cloistered-rule period, he was one of the authors of the hundred-poem sequences presented to Emperor Horikawa, known as the Horikawa Hyakushu.
The three poems from 421 to 423 are poems on falconry from the Horikawa Hyakushu. In the Horikawa Hyakushu, poets such as Minamoto no Toshiyori and Fujiwara no Kinzane each composed a hundred poems on shared topics in Horikawa's reign, and it became the model for later hundred-poem sequences. Falconry, hunting birds by loosing trained hawks, was counted among the sights of winter.
A poem by Ōtomo no Yakamochi in the Man'yōshū has the phrase "yakatao no mashiro no taka," on which this poem draws.
First line, "yakatao no": "yakatao" is a hawk's tail with barred markings like the feathers of an arrow.
Second line, "mashiro no taka o": "mashiro" is pure white, and white hawks were prized. With the first line, it draws on a phrase in Yakamochi's poem in the Man'yōshū.
Third line, "hikisuete": "hikisuu" is to hold the hawk firmly perched on one's fist.
Fourth line, "Uda no todachi o": Uda is a place in Yamato Province whose moor was a hunting ground from old times, and "todachi" are the coverts where birds gather.
Fifth line, "karikurashitsuru": "karikurasu" is to spend the day hunting until dark, and "tsuru," the attributive of the perfective "tsu," closes with a lingering resonance.
- Author
- Fujiwara no Nakazane
- Source
- Senzai Wakashu
- Prev Poem
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Asaborake Uji no kawagiri taedae ni arawarewataru seze no ajirogi
- Next Poem
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Furu yuki ni yukue mo miezu hashitaka no obusa no suzu no oto bakari shite