"My love is thick
As the herbage in spring,
It is manifold as the waves
That heap themselves on the shore
Of the great ocean."
"No more will I plant for thee
Tall trees
O cuckoo![1]
Thou comest, and with thy resounding cry
Dost increase my yearnings."
"This morn at dawn
The cuckoo's cry I heard.
Didst thou hear it, my lord,
Or wast thou still asleep?"
"I will plant for thee
A whole grove of orange-trees,
O thou cuckoo!
Where thou mayst always dwell
Even until the winter."
"It is dawn;
I cannot sleep for thoughts of her I love.
What is to be done
With this cuckoo
That goes on singing?"
"Were only thy hand
Lying in mine,
What matter though men's words
Were copious as the herbage
Of the summer meads."
"Since we are such things
That if we are born
We must some day die,
So long as this life lasts
Let us enjoy ourselves."
- ↑ The Japanese have quite different associations with the cuckoo from ourselves. They hear in its cry the longings of unsatisfied love. It is true that it is not the same bird as ours, but an allied species with a different note. Its name (in Japanese, Hototogisu) is onomatopoetic.
