Michishiba no tsuyu to okinuru hito yori mo waga tamakura no sode wa kawakazu - Izumi Shikibu Nikki(English Translation & Meaning)

道芝の露とおきぬる人よりも
我手枕のそてはかはかす

Roma-ji: Michishiba no tsuyu to okinuru hito yori mo waga tamakura no sode wa kawakazu
English Translation: Even more than you
who rose and left like dew
on the wayside grass,
this sleeve on which you pillowed me
never dries at all
Meaning: More than you, who rose and left like dew settling on the wayside grass, it is my arm-pillow sleeve that never dries.
Commentary: 26 The Invitation to the Prince's Residence

After their exchange about the arm-pillow sleeve, the prince came to feel deep tenderness for Izumi Shikibu, and for a while he visited often, seeing how she lived. She was not a worldly woman, and seeing how forlorn she looked, he felt sorry for her and spoke to her with feeling: "Not a day passes that I do not think of you sitting here idle and lost in thought; come to my residence instead. People seem to say only bad things about you. Perhaps because I come only now and then, no one has caught me, but still people say ugly things, and each time I go home I feel wretched and unworthy, and there are times I wonder what to do. Perhaps because I am old-fashioned at heart, what we have said to each other moves me deeply. Even so, I cannot keep coming like this forever, and if someone really heard of it and stopped me, I would become as distant as the moon crossing the sky. If you are as lonely as you say, would you not come there? There are people there, but it would not be unseemly. I have always been ill-suited to such matters, and I do not even stay in empty rooms; I perform my devotions all alone, and I think that if I had someone of the same heart to talk with, I might find some comfort." Izumi Shikibu wondered what to make of so unsuitable a position at this late stage. Yet she had no one to guide her to a life beyond the mountains, and living on like this felt like a night that would never dawn; many men courted her, people gossiped strangely, and she had no other dependable prospect. Why not try it, then? His principal wife was there, but in separate quarters, and his nurse was said to manage everything; so long as she did nothing conspicuous and stayed in some suitable, hidden place, what harm could there be? Surely this damp robe of false rumor would dry in time. So she said, "I think of no one but you. To distract myself I have nothing but to wait for your rare visits, so I will do as you say." The prince promised reassuringly to prepare a well-hidden place and let her know, and left deep in the night. With the lattice still raised, she lay alone, wondering anxiously whether she would become a laughingstock.
The woman is Izumi Shikibu, daughter of Ōe no Masamune and, as the wife of Tachibana no Michisada, Governor of Izumi, mother of Koshikibu no Naishi. The Prince of the Dazaifu is Prince Atsumichi, fourth son of Emperor Reizei, so called because he served as Governor-General of the Dazaifu. His principal wife was a daughter of Fujiwara no Naritoki.
When the prince, having left deep in the night, sent "Tsuyu musubu michi no mani mani asaborake nurete zo kitsuru tamakura no sode," Izumi Shikibu was charmed that, trifling though it was, he had not forgotten the arm-pillow sleeve, and sent back this poem.
The moon that night also shone very bright and clear, and each of them gazed at it until dawn in their separate places. The next morning, while the prince was having his page boy called to carry a letter, a poem about the frost arrived from her first.

The opening lines mean "you who rose and left like dew on the wayside grass," where "oki" means both dew settling and rising from bed, answering his "road where the dew gathers." The third line means "more than you."
The lower verses mean "my arm-pillow sleeve does not dry," answering his "came home with the arm-pillow sleeve wet." She replies that her own sleeve, left behind, is far wetter with tears than his, soaked with dew on the way home, and so closes their exchange about the arm-pillow sleeve with the depth of feeling of the one who waits.
Author: Izumi Shikibu
Source: Izumi Shikibu Nikki
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