The Man of the Ariwara Clan
My caution
is quite defeated
by my yearning for you:
if we can but meet,
let happen what may! The woman retreated to her rooms, but since the man went to her as usual, unconcerned that others might see, the woman was distressed and went back to her own home. Finding this not a deterrent but, rather, a convenience, the man began visiting her at home. Everyone heard about this and laughed. When the groundskeepers saw him return to the palace in the mornings, he would take his shoes, throw them in toward the back, and enter.
While he was carrying on in this disgraceful way, it occurred to him that he would lose his position and finally be ruined, so he prayed to the gods and buddhas, saying, " Please put an end to these feelings! " But his love for her only increased, and his yearning was unbearable. He summoned yin-yang diviners and shamanesses, made preparations for a ritual ablution that would end his love, and went out to the river. But after the ritual he grew only more despondent and longed for her even more.
The gods
have not accepted
the rites I performed
here at the sacred river
to end my yearning.
The emperor was a handsome man, and when the woman heard him chanting the Buddha's name with great solemnity in a noble voice, she wept bitterly. " What an unfortunate fate. How sad I am to be unable to serve such a lord, to be shackled to that man! " she said and wept. At this time, the emperor heard of the affair and sent the man into exile. He made the woman go to her cousin, his mother, who chastised her by shutting her up in a storehouse. Confined in the storehouse, she wept.
In the name of the creature
that lives in the seaweed
reaped by fisherfolk,
I cry, " It is my fault! "
and don't blame the world. When she cried like this, the man, who returned every night from the province to which he had been exiled, played his flute with fervor and sang of his feelings in moving tones. Thus the woman, though shut up in the storehouse, could hear that he was there, but they were unable to meet. She thought:
How sad that he should still
hope we might meet,
not knowing
I am here
but not here. As for the man, since he could not meet her, he wandered about in this way and went back to the provinces, singing this:
I went away
in vain
only to return:
my desire to see her
luring me back again.
This must have been during the reign of Emperor Seiwa. The mother of the emperor was the Somedono empress. Or she might have been the empress of the Fifth Ward.
is quite defeated
by my yearning for you:
if we can but meet,
let happen what may! The woman retreated to her rooms, but since the man went to her as usual, unconcerned that others might see, the woman was distressed and went back to her own home. Finding this not a deterrent but, rather, a convenience, the man began visiting her at home. Everyone heard about this and laughed. When the groundskeepers saw him return to the palace in the mornings, he would take his shoes, throw them in toward the back, and enter.
While he was carrying on in this disgraceful way, it occurred to him that he would lose his position and finally be ruined, so he prayed to the gods and buddhas, saying, " Please put an end to these feelings! " But his love for her only increased, and his yearning was unbearable. He summoned yin-yang diviners and shamanesses, made preparations for a ritual ablution that would end his love, and went out to the river. But after the ritual he grew only more despondent and longed for her even more.
The gods
have not accepted
the rites I performed
here at the sacred river
to end my yearning.
The emperor was a handsome man, and when the woman heard him chanting the Buddha's name with great solemnity in a noble voice, she wept bitterly. " What an unfortunate fate. How sad I am to be unable to serve such a lord, to be shackled to that man! " she said and wept. At this time, the emperor heard of the affair and sent the man into exile. He made the woman go to her cousin, his mother, who chastised her by shutting her up in a storehouse. Confined in the storehouse, she wept.
In the name of the creature
that lives in the seaweed
reaped by fisherfolk,
I cry, " It is my fault! "
and don't blame the world. When she cried like this, the man, who returned every night from the province to which he had been exiled, played his flute with fervor and sang of his feelings in moving tones. Thus the woman, though shut up in the storehouse, could hear that he was there, but they were unable to meet. She thought:
How sad that he should still
hope we might meet,
not knowing
I am here
but not here. As for the man, since he could not meet her, he wandered about in this way and went back to the provinces, singing this:
I went away
in vain
only to return:
my desire to see her
luring me back again.
This must have been during the reign of Emperor Seiwa. The mother of the emperor was the Somedono empress. Or she might have been the empress of the Fifth Ward.
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