Kokinshu #116
A poem from the poetry contest held in the palace of the consort in the Kanpyô era.
Though I came to pluck
the young greens in the spring fields,
my way was confused
by the flowers of late spring
mingling and scattering.
haru no no ni
wakana tsumamu to
koshi mono o
chirikau hana ni
michi wa madoinu
---L.
Though I came to pluck
the young greens in the spring fields,
my way was confused
by the flowers of late spring
mingling and scattering.
—19 July 2011
(Original by Ki no Tsurayuki.) Picking young greens is done in early spring (starting back some 90 poems ago) while flowers scattering is a late spring event -- giving an effect that's almost Rip-Van-Winkle-ish, or maybe I should say Urashima-ish. To make the timeslip more clear out of cultural context, I added "of late spring."haru no no ni
wakana tsumamu to
koshi mono o
chirikau hana ni
michi wa madoinu
---L.
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---L.
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Guardian review here.
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Angelica's rescue *is* one of the vivid scenes that stands out in memory.
---L.
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(Anonymous) 2011-07-29 07:40 am (UTC)(link)Also, any particular reason why "mingling and scattering" when, if "scattering" is read as the act of departing from the branch, the logical order is the other way around?
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"Mingling and scattering" instead of the other way around for chiri-kau was purely for the sound, really -- and I had second thoughts about it. I was rationalizing it as taking place after leaving the branch: the petals swirl around mingling, and then scatter from that cloud, which is admittedly rather non-literal. An alternate line in draft was "scattering hither and yon."
---L.