Hyakunin Isshu #29
Friday, 12 February 2010 07:17![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lnhammer To pick one at all,
I must pick it at random,
for autumn's first frost
has camouflaged which of these
are the white chrysanthemums.
kokoro-ate ni
orabaya oran (or oramu)
hatsushimo no
oki madowaseru
shiragiku no hana
ETA second thought wording.
---L.
I must pick it at random,
for autumn's first frost
has camouflaged which of these
are the white chrysanthemums.
—7 February 2010
Original by Oshikochi no Mitsune, one of the compilers of the Kokinshu, where it was included as #277. Finding the white mums was important because those were used as altar offerings. The original is closer to "by guesswork" (literally, "by bits-of-heart") than "at random," but that doesn't work as well with the idiom.kokoro-ate ni
orabaya oran (or oramu)
hatsushimo no
oki madowaseru
shiragiku no hana
ETA second thought wording.
---L.