Gosenshu #1195-6

[lnhammer]

When sunset came while visiting a temple called Isonokami, she decided to stay the night and go home at dawn; someone told her "Henjô is here" and she sent this to see his reaction.

    When I spend the night
on top of a high crag,
    it is very cold:
won't you do me the favor
of lending me a moss robe?

—26 Jul 2011

Reply.

    The moss robe of one
forsaken by the world has
    only one layer --
yet not loaning it would be harsh:
so come, let's sleep together!

—26 Jul 2011

Originals by Ono no Komachi and Henjô. Here we get Komachi in a playful-shading-to-flirtatious mode, and in reply, Henjô gets ... well, "flirtatious" doesn't come close. Which was the one with a reputation for love affairs? This is deep speculation, but given Henjô seems to have otherwise taken his religious vows seriously, I wonder whether he got away with being sexually overt because he knew his bluff wouldn't be called. Regardless, this exchange is the only one we have where someone gets the best of Komachi. Isonokami may have been the one in Nara; its name can, like her first line iwa no ue, mean "atop a rock." "Moss robe" was a common name for the coarse robe worn by a Buddhist monk or priest. (Grammar note: I don't understand why the fourth line of #1196 isn't kasazu wa utoshi, since the effect of the -ba ("when") is a conditional. Or maybe I'm analyzing it too much in terms of English grammar.)


iwa no ue
tabine no sureba
ito samushi
koke no koromo o
ware ni kasanamu

yo no somuku
koke no koromo wa
tada hitoe
kasaneba utoshi
iza futari nemu

---L.