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Audio: NHK Creative Library
Read by LibriVox volunteer Larry Wilson.
Audio courtesy of LibriVox (Public Domain).
源宗于朝臣
山里は
冬ぞさびしさ
まさりける
人目も草も
かれぬと思へば
ひとめもく
さもかれぬ
とおもへは
やまざ
- Poem 28
- 山里は
冬ぞさびしさ
まさりける
人目も草も かれぬと思へば
Author: Minamoto no Muneyuki Ason (dates unknown–939)
Source: Kokin Wakashū, Winter
- English Verse Translation
- The mountain village solitude In winter time I dread; It seems as if, when friends are gone,
And trees their leaves have shed, All men and plants are dead.
— William N. Porter, 1909
- Modern Translation
- In a mountain village, loneliness deepens in winter. Not only people disappear — the grass too withers away.
- Commentary
- A mountain village is already a lonely place, but in winter that loneliness deepens further. The scene of no visitors coming and the grasses withering away seems to overlap with the poet's own lament over his stalled career. He may have seen his own circumstances — overlooked by others — reflected in the desolate winter mountain village.
- About the Poet
- Minamoto no Muneyuki Ason, despite his high birth as a grandson of Emperor Kōkō, was removed from the imperial family and served the court as a subject. He presented poems to Emperor Uda and had his talent recognized, but was never rewarded with high rank. Because the Heian imperial family practiced polygamy, princes had many children, and by the time one reached the rank of grandson, special treatment was rarely extended.
- Minamoto no Muneyuki Ason's Chart of the Heart
-
A chart and a modern-language reflection of the poet's inner feelings.
The Poet's Feelings (A Personal Interpretation)
The winter mountain village lies in silence —
not a single visitor in sight.Watching the grasses wither away,
I feel myself fading from memory too.
- Poem Illustration
-
This image is based on an illustration from William N. Porter's A Hundred Verses from Old Japan, his 1909 English translation of the Hyakunin Isshu published in England, colorized and reworked using Adobe Firefly (generative AI).