CHORUS.
“Wait, wait, wait!”
Dimmer grow the voices; dimmer the ship, the wide waves
Pile up behind it.
The voices stop. The ship, the men
Have vanished. All is gone
There is an ancient Kōwaka dance called Iō go Shima, “Sulphur Island,” another name for Devil’s Island. It represents the piety of Naritsune and Yasuyori, and the amoral mysticism of the Zen abbot Shunkwan. Part of the text is as follows:
NARITSUNE.
This is the vow of the Holy One,
The God of Kumano:
“Whosoever of all mortal men
Shall turn his heart to me,
Though he be come to the utmost end of the desert,
To the furthest fold of the hills,
I will send a light to lead him;
I will guide him on his way.”
And we exiled on this far rock,
By daily honour to the Triple Shrine,
By supplication to Kumano’s God,
Shall compass our return.
Shunkwan, how think you?
SHUNKWAN.
Were it the Hill King of Hiyei,[208] I would not say no. But as for this God of Kumano, I have no faith in him. (Describing the actions of NARITSUNE and YASUYORI.)
Then lonely, lonely these two to worship went;
On the wide sea they gazed,
Roamed on the rugged shore;
Searching ever for a semblance
Of the Three Holy Hills.
Now, where between high rocks
A long, clear river flowed;
Now where tree-tops soar
Summit on summit upward to the sky.
And there they planned to set
The Mother-Temple, Hall of Proven Truth;
And here the Daughter-Shrine,
The Treasury of Kan.
Then far to northward aiming
To a white cliff they came, where from the clouds
Swift waters tumbled down.
Then straightway they remembered
The Hill of Nachi, where the Dragon God,
Winged water-spirit, pants with stormy breath
And fills the woods with awe.
Here reverently they their Nachi set.
The Bonze Shunkwan mounted to a high place;
His eye wandered north, south, east and west.
A thousand, thousand concepts filled his heart.
Suddenly a black cloud rose before him,
A heavy cloak of cloud;
And a great rock crashed and fell into the sea.
Then the great Bonze in his meditation remembered
An ancient song:
“The wind scattered a flower at Buddha’s feet;
A boulder fell and crushed the fish of the pool.
Neither has the wind merit, nor the boulder blame;
They know not what they do.”
“The Five Limbs are a loan,” he cried, “that must be repaid;
A mess of earth, water, air, fire.
And the heart—void, as the sky; shapeless, substanceless!
Being and non-being
Are but twin aspects of all component things.
And that which seems to be, soon is not.
But only contemplation is eternal.”
So the priest: proudly pillowed
On unrepentance and commandments broke.