Kokinshu #299
Sunday, 9 September 2012 07:41![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lnhammer Written on seeing autumn leaves when he was living in a place called Ono.
When the autumn hills
offer up these colored leaves
as prayer strips,
even I, abiding here,
feel I'm making a journey.
* Well, unless you count all those Tatsuta Rivers that I forgot to note.
aki no yama
momiji o nusa to
tamukureba
sumu ware sae zo
tabigokochi suru
---L.
When the autumn hills
offer up these colored leaves
as prayer strips,
even I, abiding here,
feel I'm making a journey.
—31 August–5 September 2012
Original by Ki no Tsurayuki. It's been a while* since we've had a key 5-syllable phrase like aki no yama ("autumn hills") unmarked on a line on its own, with the usual grammatical uncertainties: here it could be subject, location, or address (exclamation doesn't really work). The humble inflection in the headnote (roughly, "lived-and-served") suggests Tsurayuki is tied to the place by duties to his superiors -- thus my "abide" in the poem. The location of Ono ("small field") is uncertain, but some commentaries suggest it was in the hills northeast of the capital.* Well, unless you count all those Tatsuta Rivers that I forgot to note.
aki no yama
momiji o nusa to
tamukureba
sumu ware sae zo
tabigokochi suru
---L.