Kokinshu #411

[lnhammer]

They arrived at the bank of the Sumida River between Musashi and Shimotsufusa provinces, and dismounted and sat for a while on the riverbank as they recalled the capital with great longing -- "Ah, how far we've endlessly traveled!" they grieved, lost in thought as they gazed into space. When the ferryboatman said, "Come on, get in the boat, it's getting dark," they boarded the boat to cross over, but everyone was wretched, not a one not thinking of someone in the capital. At that moment, a white bird with red bill and legs was idling on the riverbank. Because it was a bird not seen in the capital, no one could identify it. When they asked the ferryman, "What kind of bird IS this?" he said, "Why, a capital-bird," and on hearing this, [Narihira] recited:

    Since you bear that name,
well then, I shall ask you this:
    "O capital-bird,
the person I long for --
is she still alive or not?"

—17 June 2013

(Original by Ariwara no Narihira.) Later that same trip, according to Tales of Ise. The Sumida flows through what's now the east side of downtown Tokyo -- at the time, not much was there. The "capital bird" (miyakodori) could have been the black-headed gull (Larus ridibundus, called yurikamome today) or possibly the Eurasian oyster-catcher (Haematopus ostralegus), no longer resident in Japan. Once again, Narihira sifts through conditionals, wrapped this time around a pun.


na ni shi owaba
iza koto towamu
miyakodori
wa ga omou hito wa
ari ya nashi ya to

---L.

Comments

[movingfinger]

...Eurasian oystercatchers no longer live in Japan, implying, they used to? I wonder why.

[lnhammer]

If I'm understanding Japanese sources correctly, they used to be occasional visitors but haven't been seen for a while. The more I read, the more I'm inclined to the gull theory, which has added simplicity from the fact that gulls are apparently rarely seen in inland Kyoto (while the oycter-catcher elsewhere can be a freshwater/inland bird).

---L.

[(Anonymous)]

Ooh, can't believe I missed this one! This poem -- the whole exchange -- is the ultimate source, filtered through the Noh play Sumidagawa of course, for one of the best parts of Britten's _Curlew River_:

MADWOMAN
Ferryman, there the wild birds float!
I see the wild birds fly!
What are those birds?

FERRYMAN
Those? They’re only common gulls.

MADWOMAN
Gulls you may call them!
Here, by the Curlew River,
Call them, I beg of you,
Curlews of the Fenland.

FERRYMAN
I beg you your pardon.
Living in this famous place
I should have known
To call them
Curlews of the Fenland.

MADWOMAN
Instead of gulls.

TRAVELLER
A traveller at this very place cried:

MADWOMAN
"Tell me does the one I love
In this world still live?"

TRAVELLER
Thinking of his lady love...

FERRYMAN
She, too, is seeking someone lost...

TRAVELLER
Yearning for a woman...

FERRYMAN
Searching for a son...

PILGRIMS:
Birds of the Fenland, she...

FERRYMAN AND TRAVELLER
Both derive from longing,
Both from love.
"Birds of the Fenland," she will ask,
But answer they will not.
"Birds of the Fenland,
Though you float or fly
Wild birds, I cannot understand your cry!"

---------
I think I prefer "in this world still live" to "is still alive" -- the first seems to be asking, "are they HERE?" (the idea that there is somewhere else to live is obviously vital to Britten's play, if nothing else), while the second seems a bit blunter than the source would suggest. Accurate meaningwise, though.

--Matt

[lnhammer]

I've never met Curlew River before. Clearly I need to look up performances. (And I swear, half the poems in this book seem to have spawned Noh plays.)

"In this world" seems to me to point in slightly the wrong direction (for the poem, not for Britten), given the point of the bird's name. I tinkered with the line a lot, trying for something closer to "is she still there," but didn't find something with the right 'balance' and that couldn't be read as suggesting she had also gone traveling. (Narihira, I find, requires a lot of tinkering without ever quite landing on the right words.)

---L.

[(Anonymous)]

That's a good point. "Does she in the capital still live?" practically begs for a bathetic answer like "No, she moved out to the suburbs, more room for the kids."

And yes, I don't see how someone with your interests and taste could possibly dislike Curlew River -- if you have a chance to see a performance, I strongly recommend it! (It's not bad on CD, either, but since the unusual staging was part of Britten's point, it obviously loses something. Dunno about DVD, last time I checked there weren't any that I could get hold of easily.) --Matt

[lnhammer]

I'll look for it.

---L.