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Kokinshu #265
Friday, 29 June 2012 07:16 Written on seeing the mist rising on Mt. Saho while traveling to Yamato Province.
For whose sake does it
think this leaf brocade exists? --
the autumn mist that
rises to conceal from us
the slopes skirting Mt. Saho.
ta ga tame no
nishiki nareba ka
akigiri no
saho no yamabe o
tachikakusuramu
---L.
For whose sake does it
think this leaf brocade exists? --
the autumn mist that
rises to conceal from us
the slopes skirting Mt. Saho.
—24-26 June 2012
Original by Ki no Tomonori. Yamato Province is the former name of Nara Prefecture, and Saho is a hill in modern Nara City famous for its autumn foliage. The brocade of autumn leaves is a metaphor borrowed from Chinese poetry -- regarding which "leaf" is a gloss-within-the-text. "Does it think" is interpretive, but possibly warranted given there's already personification and it helps keep Tomonori's polished loveliness from sound stiff in English, or at any rate even stiffer. Compare to #51 and other springtime concealers of flowers passim.ta ga tame no
nishiki nareba ka
akigiri no
saho no yamabe o
tachikakusuramu
---L.