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Audio: NHK Creative Library
Read by LibriVox volunteer Larry Wilson.
Audio courtesy of LibriVox (Public Domain).
小式部内侍
大江山
いく野の道の
遠ければ
まだふみもみず
天の橋立
またふみも
みすあまの
はしたて
おおえ
- Poem 60
- 大江山
いく野の道の
遠ければ
まだふみもみず 天の橋立
Author: Koshikibu no Naishi (d. 1025)
Source: Kin'yō Wakashū, Miscellaneous
- English Verse Translation
- So long and dreary is the road, That I have never been To Ama-no-Hashidate; Pray, how could I
have seen The verses that you mean?
— William N. Porter, 1909
- Modern Translation
- The road to Oe Mountain and Ikuno is so long and far — I have not yet set foot on it, nor received a letter from my mother.
- Commentary
- This poem was composed on the spot by Koshikibu no Naishi when Fujiwara no Sadayori (Poem 64), at a poetry contest, teased her by asking whether her mother, Izumi Shikibu, had ghostwritten her poems for her. So sharp was her witty reply that Sadayori was left speechless and hurried away from the scene. Mount Ōe, Ikuno, and Ama-no-Hashidate, named in the poem, are all places along the road to Tango in northern Kyoto Prefecture, where Izumi Shikibu was living at the time.
- About the Poet
- Koshikibu no Naishi was known by the court name "Koshikibu," derived from her mother Izumi Shikibu's name. Like her mother, she served Empress Shōshi, but died young after childbirth in her twenties. The Izumi Shikibu Shū includes elegiac poems Izumi Shikibu wrote mourning her daughter's early death.
- Koshikibu no Naishi'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)
Caught off guard by the question,
I answer, calm and unshaken.With one light, easy verse,
let me show you what I'm made of.
- 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).