Page:Anthology of Japanese Literature.pdf/75

Itazura ni Yukite wa kinuru Mono yue ni Mimaku hoshisa ni Izanawaretsutsu

All in vain, I know, Are my goings and comings; So great, however, Is my desire to see her That I am ceaselessly drawn.

(LXV)

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In former times there lived a lady in East Gojō, in the Western Pavilion of the Empress Dowager’s palace. Narihira visited her there, at first with no specific intentions but later in great infatuation. About the tenth day of the first month, however, she concealed herself elsewhere. Although he heard where her refuge was, it was impossible for him to go to her, and he became increasingly depressed. In the first month of the following year, when the plum blossoms were in their full glory, he went again to the Western Pavilion, remembering with longing the happenings of the previous year. He stood and looked, sat and looked, but nothing seemed the same. Bitterly weeping, he lay on the deserted bare wooden floor until the moon sank in the sky. Recalling the happiness of the year before, he composed the poem:

Tsuki ya aranu Haru ya mukashi no Haru naranu Wa ga mi hitotsu wa Moto no mi ni shite

Is not that the moon? And is not the spring the same Spring of the old days? My body is the same body— Yet everything seems different.

(IV)

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In former times a certain lascivious woman thought: “I wish I could somehow meet a man who would show me affection!” It was, however, impossible for her to express this desire openly. She therefore made up a most unlikely dream, called her three sons together, and related it to them. Two of them dismissed it with a curt reply, but the youngest son interpreted the dream as meaning that a fine