FOOTNOTES:
[141] The play in the original is on the word Matsu, which has the double signification of "a pine-tree" and "to wait."
[142] Mount Lover and Mount Lady-love (Se-yama and Imo-yama) in the province of Yamato.
[143] The reference in this song is to an old superstition. It used to be supposed that the chance words caught from the mouths of passers-by would solve any doubt on questions to which it might otherwise be impossible to obtain an answer. This was called the yufu-ura, or "evening divination," on account of its being practised in the evening. It has been found impossible in this instance to follow the original very closely.
ELEGIES
ON THE DEATH OF THE MIKADO TENJI[144]
By One of His Ladies
Alas! poor mortal maid! unfit to hold
High converse with the glorious gods above,[145]
Each morn that breaks still finds me unconsoled,
Each hour still hears me sighing for thy love.
Wert thou a precious stone, I'd clasp thee tight
Around mine arm; wert thou a silken dress
I'd ne'er discard thee, either day or night:—
Last night, sweet love! I dreamt I saw thy face.
ON THE DEATH OF THE POET'S MISTRESS
How fondly did I yearn to gaze
(For was there not the dear abode
Of her whose love lit up my days?)
On Karu's often-trodden road.
But should I wander in and out,
Morning and evening ceaselessly,
Our loves were quickly noised about,
For eyes enough there were to see.
So, trusting that as tendrils part
To meet again, so we might meet,
As in deep rocky gorge my heart,
Unseen, unknown, in secret beat.
But like the sun at close of day,
And as behind a cloud the moon,
So passed my gentle love away,
An autumn leaf ta'en all too soon.
When came the fatal messenger,
I knew not what to say or do:—
But who might sit and simply hear?
Rather, methought, of all my woe.
Haply one thousandth part might find
Relief if my due feet once more,
Where she so often trod, should wind
Through Karu's streets and past her door.
But mute that noise, nor all the crowd
Could show her like, or soothe my care;
So, calling her dear name aloud,
I waved my sleeve in blank despair.
Hitomaro.
ELEGY ON THE POET'S WIFE
The gulls that twitter on the rush-grown shore
When fall the shades of night,
That o'er the waves in loving pairs do soar
When shines the morning light—
'Tis said e'en these poor birds delight
To nestle each beneath his darling's wing
That, gently fluttering,
Through the dark hours wards off the hoar-frost's might.
Like to the stream that finds
The downward path it never may retrace,
Like to the shapeless winds,
Poor mortals pass away without a trace:—
So she I love has left her place,
And, in a corner of my widowed couch,
Wrapped in the robe she wove me,
I must crouch,
Far from her fond embrace.
Nibi.
ON THE DEATH OF PRINCE HINAMI
I
When began the earth and heaven,
By the banks of heaven's river[146]
All the mighty gods assembled,
All the mighty gods in council.
And, for that her sov'reign grandeur
The great goddess of the day-star
Rul'd th' ethereal realms of heaven,
Downward through the many-piled
Welkin did they waft her grandson,
Bidding him, till earth and heaven,
Waxing old, should fall together,
O'er the middle land of reed-plains,
O'er the land of waving rice-fields,
Spread abroad his power imperial.
II
But not his Kiyomi's palace:—
'Tis his sov'reign's, hers the empire;
And the sun's divine descendant,
Ever soaring, passeth upward
Through the heav'n's high rocky portals.
III
Why, dear prince, oh! why desert us?
Did not all beneath the heaven,
All that dwell in earth's four quarters,
Pant, with eye and heart uplifted,
As for heav'n-sent rain in summer,
For thy rule of flow'ry fragrance,
For thy plenilune of empire?
Now on lone Mayúmi's hillock,
Firm on everlasting columns,
Pilest thou a lofty palace,
Whence no more, when day is breaking,
Sound thine edicts, awe-compelling.
Day to day is swiftly gathered,
Moon to moon, till e'er thy faithful
Servants from thy palace vanish.
Hitomaro.
ON THE DEATH OF THE NUN RIGUWAÑ
Ofttimes in far Corea didst thou hear
Of our Cipango as a goodly land;
And so, to parents and to brethren dear
Bidding adieu, thou sailed'st to the strand
Of these domains, that own th' imperial pow'r,
Where glittering palaces unnumbered rise;
Yet such might please thee not, nor many a bow'r
Where village homesteads greet the pilgrim's eyes:—
But in this spot, at Sahoyáma's base,
Some secret influence bade thee find thy rest—
Bade seek us out with loving eagerness,
As seeks the weeping infant for the breast.
And here with aliens thou didst choose to dwell,
Year in, year out, in deepest sympathy;
And here thou buildest thee an holy cell;
And so the peaceful years went gliding by.
But ah! what living thing mote yet avoid
Death's dreary summons?—And thine hour did sound
When all the friends on whom thine heart relied
Slept on strange pillows on the mossy ground.
So, while the moon lit up Kasuga's crest,
O'er Sahogáha's flood thy corse they bore
To fill a tomb upon yon mountain's breast,
And dwell in darkness drear for evermore.
No words, alas! nor efforts can avail:—
Nought can I do, poor solitary child!
Nought can I do but make my bitter wail,
And pace the room with cries and gestures wild,
Ceaselessly weeping, till my snowy sleeve
Is wet with tears. Who knows? Perchance, again
Wafted, they're borne upon the sighs I heave,
On 'Arima's far distant heights to rain.
Sakanouhe.
ON THE POET'S SON FURUBI
Sev'n are the treasures mortals most do prize,
But I regard them not:—
One only jewel could delight mine eyes—
The child that I begot.
My darling boy, who with the morning sun
Began his joyous day;
Nor ever left me, but with child-like fun
Would make me help him play;
Who'd take my hand when eve its shadows spread,
Saying, "I'm sleepy grown;
'Twixt thee and mother I would lay my head:—
Oh! leave me not alone!"
Then with his pretty prattle in mine ears,
I'd lie awake and scan
The good and evil of the coming years,
And see the child a man.
And, as the seaman trusts his bark, I'd trust
That nought could harm the boy:—
Alas! I wist not that the whirling gust
Would shipwreck all my joy!
Then with despairing, helpless hands I grasp'd
The sacred mirror's[147] sphere;
And round my shoulder I my garments clasp'd,
And prayed with many a tear:—
"'Tis yours, great gods, that dwell in heav'n on high,
Great gods of earth! 'tis yours
To heed, or heed not, a poor father's cry,
Who worships and implores!"
Alas! vain pray'rs, that more no more avail!
He languished day by day,
Till e'en his infant speech began to fail,
And life soon ebbed away.
Stagg'ring with grief I strike my sobbing breast,
And wildly dance and groan:—
Ah! such is life! the child that I caress'd
Far from mine arms hath flown.
SHORT STANZA ON THE SAME OCCASION
So young, so young! he cannot know the way:—
On Hades' porter I'll a bribe bestow,
That on his shoulders the dear infant may
Be safely carried to the realms below.
Attributed to Okura.