Front
Back
Japanese
English
Audio: NHK Creative Library
Read by LibriVox volunteer Larry Wilson.
Audio courtesy of LibriVox (Public Domain).
二条院讃岐
わが袖は
潮干に見えぬ
沖の石の
人こそ知らね
かわくまもなし
ひとこそし
らねかわく
まもなし
わがそ
- Poem 92
- わが袖は
潮干に見えぬ
沖の石の
人こそ知らね かわくまもなし
Author: Sanuki, attendant to Retired Emperor Nijō (c. 1141–c. 1217)
Source: Senzai Wakashū, Love
- English Verse Translation
- My sleeve is wet with floods of tears As here I sit and cry; 'Tis wetter than a low-tide
rock,— No one, howe'er he try, Can find a spot that's dry!
— William N. Porter, 1909
- Modern Translation
- My sleeves are like a rock hidden beneath the tides — unseen by others, they are never dry.
- Commentary
- This poem was composed on the assigned topic of "love likened to a stone." It became so celebrated that Sanuki came to be known as "Sanuki of the Rock in the Bay." Her father, Minamoto no Yorimasa, had himself composed a poem comparing a tear-soaked pillow to a shoreline rock submerged by the rising tide, and this poem seems to carry that influence. It also draws on, as an allusive variation, a poem by Izumi Shikibu.
- About the Poet
- Sanuki served Retired Emperor Nijō, and later Empress Gishūmonin, consort of Emperor Go-Toba. As a poet, she was ranked alongside Princess Shikishi (Poem 89) among the finest of her generation. Late in her life, her father and brothers took part in Prince Mochihito's uprising, but were defeated by the Taira clan — some dying in battle, others by their own hand — after which Sanuki took Buddhist vows.
- Sanuki, attendant to retired Emperor Nijō'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)
Somewhere no one will ever notice,
I quietly let my tears fall.Like a stone sunk in the still depths of the sea,
I go on carrying this feeling, and nothing else.
- 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).