Front
Back
Japanese
English
Audio: NHK Creative Library
Read by LibriVox volunteer Larry Wilson.
Audio courtesy of LibriVox (Public Domain).
殷富門院大輔
見せばやな
雄島のあまの
袖だにも
ぬれにぞぬれし
色はかはらず
ぬれにそぬ
れしいろは
かはらす
みせ
- Poem 90
- 見せばやな
雄島のあまの
袖だにも
ぬれにぞぬれし 色はかはらず
Author: Attendant to Empress Inpu (dates unknown)
Source: Senzai Wakashū, Love
- English Verse Translation
- The fisher's clothes, though cheap, withstand The drenching they receive; But see I my
floods of tears have blurred The colours of my sleeve, As for thy love I grieve.
— William N. Porter, 1909
- Modern Translation
- I wish I could show you — these sleeves of mine, soaked through and through with tears that never change color, never dry.
- Commentary
- The headnote in the Senzai Wakashū reads, "composed as a love poem at a poetry contest" — this was a poem on an assigned topic. In the poetic conventions of the time, weeping "tears of blood" was a standard expression for overwhelming emotion. This poem never states "tears of blood" outright, but through the phrase "the color of my sleeve," readers of the time would have understood, by unspoken convention, that it meant sleeves stained by tears of blood.
- About the Poet
- The Attendant to Empress Inpu served Empress Inpu, a daughter of Emperor Go-Shirakawa and the elder sister of Princess Shikishi (Poem 89). Having composed a great many poems in her lifetime, she came to be known as "Senju Taifu" — "Taifu of a Thousand Poems."
- Attendant to Empress Inpu'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)
Tears no one else can see
quietly stain my sleeves.I only wish, somehow,
that you could know how deep this pain runs.
- 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).