Hyakunin Isshu #15

[lnhammer]

    It was for your sake
that I went in the spring fields
    to pluck these young greens,
and all the while the snowflakes
kept falling on my wide sleeves.

—14 March 2010

Original by Emperor Koukou, sent with a gift of spring herbs (eaten as part of the New Years ceremonies, which in the Chinese lunisolar calendar of the time fell usually somewhere in February) some time before his accession in 884 at the age of 54. Sometimes something straightforward, centered on a simple contrast of green and white, is refreshing to work with. A koromode is the sleeve (sode) of a koromo, a type of formal robe.


kimi ga tame
haru no no ni idete
wakana tsumu
wa ga koromode ni
yuki wa furitsutsu

---L.

Comments

[jonquil]

I'm sure you already knew this, but my readings of Sei Shonagon (in translation) refer to wet sleeves as a very common/overused metaphor for crying.

[lnhammer]

Oh, indeedy yes. There's already been some in what I've translated so far (including someone wringing out tear-sodden sleeves) and many to come. I don't think it's a metaphor so much as a conventionalized act associated with and so standing for weeping. Copiously. And, of course, elegantly.

---L.

[jonquil]

Do you think the snow on the sleeves might be an elliptic reference to that?

[lnhammer]

I don't think so -- it reads like an elegant way to contrast a spring rite with snowfall. There's no mention of wetness, after all.

Commentators are also silent on the association, as well.

I called the koromo a formal robe above, but apparently it was specifically worn only by members of the imperial family. Coupled with actually using "you", instead of letting it as usual be understood, I suspect there's more hierarchy games than armorous ones.

---L.

[lnhammer]

Also, grammatically, the sleeve is what picks the greens, via a relative clause,* so is here a stand-in for the speaker or his hand/arm. Not that Japanese poets wouldn't try to also pack another, orthogonal emotional layer into a poem, but this one is otherwise so straightforward -- completely regular syntax and practically end-stopped on every line.

* Literal recension: "[For] your sake [I] go into the spring fields and snow falls (frequentive aspect) on the robe-sleeves that pick young greens."

---L.

[jonquil]

Thank you. I enjoyed reading this.

[lnhammer]

De nada.

Although, argh, ignore part of the previous comment -- I just realized I've been misreading something: not only is it not "the" but "my" robe-sleeve, but it's actually "on the robe-sleeves of I who picks young greens," with the relative clause "that/who picks" modifying the "I" part of "my". This is a little more clear if waga (which is often romanized as one word) was written wa ga, separating "I" from the possessive particle.

Talking things through helps me think them through.

---L.