Kokinshu Book IX: Travel (406-421)

[larryhammer]

Following partings with travelers, in Book IX we get poems of travelers on the road. This is, surprisingly, the shortest book in the Kokinshu -- you might think, especially given the Man'yoshu tradition, it would be a more popular genre. Apparently, though, just as the provinces -- that is, any place that wasn't the happening capital -- were unfashionable, so were the vicissitudes of traveling out there. In later poetry, the topic would return as a suitably refined loneliness, but for now, it seems the editors had slim pickings to chose from.

But enough -- let's get this show on the road. So to speak.

406.  Abe no Nakamaro Written on seeing the moon in China.
ama no hara furisake mireba kasuga naru mikasa no yama ni ideshi tsuki kamo kono uta wa, mukashi nakamaro o morokoshi ni mono narabashi ni tsukawashitarikeru ni, amata no toshi o hete e kaeri maude kozarikeru o, kono kuni yori mata tsukaimakari itarikeru ni taguite, maude kinamu tote idetachikeru ni, meishiu to iu tokoro no umibe nite kano kuni mo hito muma no hana mukeshikeri, yoru ni narite tsuki no ito omoshikusashi idetarikeru o mite yomeru to namu katari tsutauru	When I look up at the distant plains of heaven,     the moon that arose over Mikasa Mountain in the shrine of Kasuga! Regarding this poem, the story is told that long ago Nakamaro was sent to study in China; after many years of not being able to go home, he had the chance to accompany a returning envoy from this country. When they set off, the people of that country held a banquet to see them off on the seashore of a place called Meishiu (Mingzhou). As night fell, an especially beautiful moon rose, and on seeing it he wrote this.
Nakamaro was born c.700 and sent to Tang China to study in 717, where he died 54 years later. While there, he took the civil service exam and rose through the bureaucratic ranks to governor-general of a border province, and became friends with poets Li Bo and Wang Wei. The banquet took place in 753, before his second of four failed attempts to return to Japan -- he had bad travel luck. This is his only poem in the Kokinshu -- not to mention its oldest datable poem. ¶ The book of travels starts, appropriately enough, with settings off -- and this poem has two of them: Kasuga Shrine, at the foot of Mt. Mikasa near the then-capital Nara, was where departing envoys prayed for a safe return. Mingzhou is an old name for what's now Ningbo in Zhejiang Province, China.
407.  Ono no Takamura Sent to someone in the capital as he boarded the ship when he was banished to Oki Province.
wata no hara yasoshima kakete kogiidenu to hito ni wa tsugeyo ama no tsuribune	Tell that one, at least, you boats of the fishermen,     that I have set out rowing through the Eighty Isles across the watery plain.
The occasion is his 834 exile for refusing to join an embassy to China (see #335) -- in effect, "I may not have gotten on that boat, but this one..." Who the boats are to tell is ambiguous and could be plural, but given the apparently contrastive wa, a single person seems likely. Eighty Islands is both a name for the Japanese archipelago and a generically large number (it could also be rendered as "endless isles"), and an ambiguous verb makes it possible to endlessly debate whether he has set out towards them or they are set out upon on the sea. And speaking of that sea, wata (see #250) was in his time an already archaic/poetic word for it, thus my poeticized rendering. In contrast to the previous, this is a poem on leaving rather than heading toward the homeland, further linked by of starting with the plain of the sea (wata no hara) instead of the plain of heaven (ama no hara).
408.  Author unknown Topic unknown.
miyako idete kyô mika no hara izumigawa kawakaze semushi koromo kaseyama	I left the capital -- today, seeing Mika Plain's     Izumi River, the river wind is chilly. Mt. Lending, lend me a robe!
Another poem with a plain, continuing the connection of the first two poems. All three places are south of the capital, named in order as they appeared on the road to Nara -- they still do, but Mika Plain is now known as Kame Plain and Izumi River, which starts in it, is now Kitsu River. Pivot-word: the name of Mt. Kase is also read as a command to "lend." Commentaries debate whether to also read the mi- of Mika Plain as "see," mika as "three days," or izumi as "when see," with the latter especially frowned upon as overdoing things (not to mention clogging up what's already compressed syntax).
409.  (Author unknown) (Topic unknown.)
honobono to akashi no ura no akagiri ni shimagakureyuku fune o shi zo omou kono uta wa, aru hito iwaku, kakinomoto [no] hitomaro ga uta nari	Faintly, faintly, Akashi Inlet at dawn --     in the morning mist a boat goes concealed behind an island -- my thoughts with it. Some say this poem is by Kakinomoto no Hitomaro.
After starting off, we get a border crossing: Akashi ("bright rock") Inlet, a little west of modern Kobe between Awaji Island and the mainland, was the border between the "home" and "outer" provinces. Because of the bright part of its name (which can be read as a pivot-word also meaning "dawn"), it sometimes appears with the stock epithet "dimly" -- which here plays into the delicate conceit, one closer to the manner of Hitomaro's time than others dubiously attributed to him in the Kokinshu. This poem was cited by Fujiwara no Teika as an model of writing with "elegant beauty," and in medieval times, allegorical interpretations of this poem were handed down as esoteric teachings (one tradition held that it is mourning an imperial prince). One result of reproducing the order of images, an important effect, is not just breaking the long smooth sweep of the last four lines but doing so in a way that enforces one particular interpretation -- it's possible to read the original as the speaker imagining the scene rather than directly observing it. Also possible: the speaker doesn't merely think about but longs for the boat (and presumably its departing passenger).
410.  Ariwara no Narihira He invited one or two friends to go with him to the eastern provinces. When they arrived at a place called Eight Bridges in Mikawa Province, they saw rabbit-ear irises blooming especially beautifully on the river bank. Dismounting in the shade of a tree, he said he'd write [a poem] on the feeling of traveling with the characters of "ka-ki-tsu-ba-ta" (rabbit-ear iris) placed at the start of every line, and then wrote this.
karakoromo kitsutsu narenishi tsuma shi areba harubaru kinuru tabi o shi zo omou	Because I've a wife as familiar as a cozy,     well-worn Chinese robe, I feel like a traveler who has come from far away.
Now for some actual traveling. Mikawa Province is now Aichi Prefecture, and the site is now an iris garden on the grounds of Muryoju Temple in modern Chiryû city. In addition to the acrostic, Narihira has included an adverbial stock epithet (the Chinese robe), at least one pivot-word (nare- is "well-worn" for the robe and "familiar" for the wife, creating an implicit comparison), and five imagistically associated words -- thus showing he was as much a technical master as Ono no Komachi, though he didn't often show off this way. (Tsuma meaning "wife" / "hem/skirt" of the robe is another possible pivot, but I don't see how to join the phrases together -- I read the double-meaning as one of the word associations.) The rabbit-ear iris (Iris laevigata) is a purple Japanese species that grows in marshy ground. (Note that the acrostic word's -ba- and the fourth line's ha- are different in modernized spellings but were identical at the time.)
411.  (Ariwara no Narihira) They arrived at the bank of the Sumida River between Musashi and Shimotsufusa provinces, and dismounted and sat for a while on the riverbank as they recalled the capital with great longing -- "Ah, how far we've endlessly traveled!" they grieved, lost in thought as they gazed into space. When the ferryman said, "Come on, get in the boat, it's getting dark," they boarded the boat to cross over, but everyone was wretched, not a one not thinking of someone in the capital. At that moment, a white bird with red bill and legs was idling on the riverbank. Because it was a bird not seen in the capital, no one could identify it. When they asked the ferryman, "What kind of bird IS this?" he said, "Why, a capital-bird," and on hearing this, [Narihira] recited:
na ni shi owaba iza koto towamu miyakodori wa ga omou hito wa ari ya nashi ya to	Since you bear that name, well then, I shall ask you this:     "O capital-bird, the person I'm longing for -- is she still alive or not?"
Later that same trip, according to Tales of Ise. The Sumida flows through what's now the east side of downtown Tokyo -- at the time, not much was there. The "capital-bird" (miyakodori) was probably a black-headed gull (Larus ridibundus, called yurikamome today), but the name was also used for the Eurasian oyster-catcher (Haematopus ostralegus), no longer resident in Japan. Once again, Narihira sifts through conditionals, wrapped this time around a pun.
412.  Author unknown Topic unknown.
kita e yuku kari zo nakunaru tsurete koshi kazu wa tarade zo kaeruberanaru kono uta wa, aru hito, otoko onna morotomo ni hito no kuni e makarikeri. otoko makari itarite sunawachi mi makarinikereba, onna hitori miyako e kaerikeru michi ni, kaeru kari no nakikeru o kikite yomeru to namu iu.	I hear the wild geese crying as they head north.     Surely the number they brought here was greater than those who are returning home. Some say that a man and woman went out into the provinces together, where the man died right after they arrived. While returning alone to the capital, the woman heard on the road the cries of wild geese returning (north) and wrote this poem.
Blanket disclaimer: any time an animal "cries," assume the naku/"call"/"weep" wordplay is involved. "Here" and "home" are interpretive but strongly implied by the verbs. The two emphatic statements with similar sentence structures comes across as a bit flat, even with the speculative conjugation, but Tsurayuki apparently liked this, as he later quoted it in Tosa Diary. The mild implication that the woman is heading the opposite direction from the geese has provoked occasional speculation that the man may have been a soldier involved in the "pacification" of northern Honshu.
413.  [Mibu no] Oto Written on the road while returning to the capital from the eastern provinces.
yama kakusu haru no kasumi zo urameshiki izure miyako no sakai naruramu	It is so hateful, this springtime haze concealing     the mountain ranges. Where among them might be the capital's boundary?
Little is known about Oto aside from that she was a daughter of Mibu no Yoshinari (who had a career as a middling courtier in the 870s and '80s). This is her only poem in the Kokinshu. ¶ Another woman returning "home." "Ranges" is an interpretive addition, trying to convey something of the landscape the scene implies.
414.  Ôshikôchi no Mitsune Written on seeing White Mountain when he traveled to Koshi.
kiehatsuru toki shi nakereba koshiji naru shirayama no na wa yuki no zo arikeru	There's never a time it melts completely away --     I see now the name of White Mountain on the road to Koshi is from that snow.
Contra his claim in #383, Mitsune did indeed get to see White Mountain. Unreproducible wordplay: koshi (the region) can be read as "came" and yuki ("snow") can be read as "going." Not so much a travel poem as a diary entry -- from the journal not intended for later publication.
415.  Ki no Tsurayuki Written on the road when traveling to the eastern provinces.
ito ni yoru mono naranaku ni wakareji no kokorobosoku mo omooyuru ka na	It isn't something that gets twisted into thread,     yet it seems to me that the road down which we part is, alas!, thin-spirited.
Wordplay at the heart of this: kororobosoi, "forlorn/discouraging/hopeless," is literally "heart narrow/thin." It may not be thin as a thread, but parting makes the heart feel that way. This poem has not fared well with critics, with one famously calling it a "rubbish poem" (literally trashed!), and a medieval writer described it as the least esteemed of the Kokinshu. It is, certainly, a weak effort for Tsurayuki -- though in general, he's not very convincing at emotions.
416.  Ôshikôchi no Mitsune Written on the road when traveling to Kai Province.
yo o samumi oku hatsushimo o haraitsutsu kusa no makura ni amatatabi nenu	With the nights so cold, I brushed off the early frosts     over and over before lying down again upon my grass pillow.
Kai is modern Yamanashi Prefecture, and Mitsune was appointed a minor provincial official there in 894. Despite it being literally the "first" frost, implying one especially restless night, the construction otherwise suggests this happened over several nights of travel. Of all the poems in this book, this is most in the manner of later travel poets focused on the isolation of life on the road.
417.  Fujiwara no Kanesuke While traveling to the hot springs of Tajima Province, he stopped for the night at a place called Futami Bay. The company recited poems as they ate a meal of dried rice, and he composed this.
yûzuku yo obotsukanaki o tamakushige futami no ura wa akete koso mime	In the moonlit night, it's obscure -- the jeweled box-lid     that's Futami Bay: it's when the dawn opens up that we'll see its underneath.
Approaching the end of the book, the tone gets lighter. Tajima is now the northern half of Hyôgo Prefecture and its hot springs are the resort area of Kinosaki (now part of Toyooka city), but the exact location of Futami ("twice-seen") is uncertain. Rice that was cooked and then dried was common rations for soldiers and travelers. Tamakushige, "(of) a jeweled comb-box," is a stock epithet for Futami because the futa part can mean "lid." Usually this would be just a decorative phrase, but the sense is carried forward with more pivot-words: ura = "inlet" / "underside" and akate = "dawn and" / "open and," giving the whole second half two overlaid readings: "as for the Inlet of Futami, when it dawns we'll see it" and "as for the underside of the lid, when we open (it) we'll see it." Very clever, but it does not translate well. I arbitrarily assume their lodgings overlook the bay, ignore the "twice-seen" meaning, and ask the reader to pretend "its" and "it's" are spelled the same.
418.  Ariwara no Narihira When Prince Koretaka went hunting with some friends, they came to the bank of a place called Amanogawa, whereupon they drank sake. When the prince said, "Offer me up a cup while reciting a poem on the feeling of arriving at the beach of the River of Heaven (ama-no-gawa) while hunting," [Narihira] recited:
karikurashi tanabatatsume ni yado karamu ama no kawara ni ware wa kinikeri	I've hunted till dark: let's hunt after lodgings from     the Weaver Maiden -- for I've arrived at the beach of the River of Heaven.
Textual issue: my base text has tanabatazume, which makes no sense -- the actual name is tanabata-tsu-me (spelled correctly in #175), "Tanabata Woman," where the tsu is a genitive marker; I've removed two dots to so emend it. For Koretaka, see #74. According to Tales of Ise, this and the next poem are from the same outing as #53, and again show Narihira playing the amusing courtier -- even the sounds are playful, in the original. Amanogawa, now written "heaven-field river," is a small tributary of the Yodo running through modern Hirakata City, about halfway between Kyoto and modern Osaka.
419.  Ki no Aritsune The Prince repeatedly recited the poem but was unable to reply, so [Aritsune], who was with them, composed this for him.
hitotose ni hitotabi kimasu kimi mateba yado kasu hito mo araji to zo omou	Given she awaits a m'lord husband who visits     but one time a year, I rather think she isn't someone who'd give us lodgings.
Aritsune (815-877) was another offspring of Ki no Natora, and so brother of Mikuni no Machi/Kaneko (see #152) and Sanjô no Machi (see #930) and uncle of their sons, princes Tsuneyasu (see #95) and Koretaka. He was also father-in-law of Ariwara no Narihira, and both uncle and father-in-law of Fujiwara no Toshiyuki (see #169). Despite these connections, he never rose above middling courtier and has only this one poem in the Kokinshu. ¶ Nice try. Not as nice as Narihira's, though. "Us" is interpretive -- "another man" is also possible. "Visits" has a rare use of an honorific form in a poem.
420.  Sugawara no Michizane Written at Mt. Tamuke when the Suzaku Retired Emperor [Uda] journeyed to Nara.
kono tabi wa nusa mo toriaezu tamukeyama momiji no nishiki kami no manimani	For this journey now I couldn't even bring prayer strips.     On Offering Hill, a brocade of autumn leaves -- may the gods find them pleasing.
In the headnote, Uda is called Suzaku after his residence (see #230), and he took this particular excursion in the Tenth Month of 898. Ambiguities: Tamuke ("offering") could be a generic place or the name of a specific shrine along the road to Nara -- commentaries have extensively debated the issue -- and tabi could mean "trip," "occasion," or, pivotwise, both. For leaves as prayer strips, see #298ff.
421.  Sosei (Written at Mt. Tamuke when the Suzaku Retired Emperor [Uda] journeyed to Nara.)
tamuke ni wa tsuzuri no sode mo kirubeki ni momiji ni akeru kami ya kaesamu	Although I should cut my "patched sleeve" into cloth strips     as an offering, might gods who are surfeited with autumn leaves return them?
Another rhetorical question from Sosei. According to the court record of Uda's autumn outing, he joined the party for a short time when it passed his temple and wrote this as a reply to the previous. A "patched sleeve" was a common synecdoche for the robe of a Buddhist monk.

And that's the end of traveling. In the next book, the editors mix things up with a collection of wordplay poems -- some of them acrostics like #410, but most of another game entirely. These are an interesting challenge to translate, so expect it in four months or so.

(Index for this series)

---L.

Comments

[puddleshark.livejournal.com]

Gorgeous. Thank you!

I have to admit to rather liking 415 and the thin-spirited road... maybe it works better in translation.

[larryhammer]

It is indeed entirely possible that I've overinterpreted it.

---L.

[puddleshark.livejournal.com]

Coo. I'd never considered "inadvertently improving bad poetry" before as a hazard of poetry translation. There must be all sorts of instincts colliding when it comes to translating certain poems...

[larryhammer]

Oh yes. When you are, most of the time, constantly trying to make it as good as possible in order to match the quality, it's a bit of mental whiplash to consciously use awkward language or a truly strained inverted phrase, following the original ...

---L.