Kokinshu 22
Text
「歌たてまつれ」とおほせられし時に詠みてたてまつる
つらゆき
かすがのの わかなつみにや しろたへの 袖ふりはへて 人の行くらむ
Translation
When [the Emperor] said "Submit a poem," [Tsurayuki] read this and submitted it.
[Ki no] Tsurayuki
To Kasuga Plains / are they going to pick young shoots, / The white / sleeves waving / the people going.
Notes
- 「歌たてまつれ」とおほせられし時
- This is Emperor Daigo; not named because the KKS was presented to him. おほせられ is a double honorific (おほす in the honorific passive), with the past-tense し (RT of き). This is used because Tsurayuki the compiler is recounting his own past experience.
- The exact circumstance is not given; the Kokin eigasho's claim that Daigo was requesting poems for the KKS is unlikely. This may have been a screen painting poem, which were often done in response to imperial command, or perhaps a poem at a gathering or official occasion.
- や...らむ
- This sets up a structure where the first two lines are a guess based on what the poet sees in the last three.
- しろたへの
- This is often used as a pillow word for 袖 or other clothing related words. Most commentators agree that this is also referring to actual color of the sleeves, although Katagiri disagrees.
- 袖ふりはへて
- This seems to be a play on 袖振る (waving sleeves) and also ふりはへて (making effort, going through trouble). A few scholars have suggested that the entire phrase しろたへの袖 is simply a preface (序) with no actual image in the poem, but most commentators allow it to be a 有心の序, that is, a preface that also indicates the actual imagery in the poem.
- 行く
- Takeoka notes that in poetry (at least in the KKS and GSS), this is always read ゆく.
Analysis
This poem appears in Tadamine's Waka Juttei as an example of 古歌体, an "old style poem." This may be because of the use of the preface, or Kasuga Plains which is suggestive of the old capital in Nara. This poem was favored by Shunzei, who included it in his Korai futeisho and Teika, who selected it for his Shuka daitai. Sogi also felt it was interesting and was a grand, eloquent poem. Mabuchi had strong praise for it as well, calling it elegant, and saying that each word is excellently chosen.
The main interpretive question of this poem is who is speaking it and where they are. The crux is Kasuga Plain, which is near Nara. Therefore Tsurayuki cannot be honestly thinking that anyone he sees is going to Kasuga Plain. From the earliest commentary through the Edo period, this seems to have been read as simply an evocation of a spring scene, with Mabuchi specifying that it was an imaginary situation.
The Seigi was the first to specify that these are women going out to pick shoots; as Katagiri notes in a previous poem, this shoot-picking was especially associated with women. Kaneko agrees, saying that the poet is looking on the women with jealousy, wishing that he(?) could go too. Kaneko's praise for the poem is strong -- he notes the use of 人 to accentuate the difference between the poet and the women. He goes on to praise the structure of the poem as a perfect one from Tsurayuki, and one that is especially fitting for a public poem in response to Imperial command.
Miura echoes Kaneko but specifies that the imagined poet is also a girl, who is busy with housework and can't go out. In contrast to Kaneko, Miura thinks this is a poem uncharacteristic of Tsurayuki with its light, bright nature -- Kubota agrees with the brightness and freshness.
Takeoka's first claim is that this is being written in the voice of someone from the Nara period, because the weight of utamakura (poetic places) was so strong that he felt compelled to use Kasuga in his poetry. But he allows for the possibility that Tsurayuki did actually see people going out to pick shoots and wondered jokingly if they were going to the poetically appropriate Kasuga.
Katagiri's assertion that this is a screen painting is perhaps the most convincing reading. There are other poems in Tsurayuki's collection that involve spring shoots and are on screen paintings. The joy and brightness that other scholars note would fit such a public, ceremonial occasion.
Finally, Matsuda sums up the six spring shoot poems as showing a movement through time, from the burning field to the people going out to pick shoots. There is also a connection in place, with Kasuga used several times.
Other sources
- 新選和歌３１
- 古今和歌六帖４６・若菜
- 藤川五百首３１. The note says that the poem かへすまもまだあら小田のふる跡に春やおそきと若菜摘むらん given there is based on KKS 22.
- 和歌十体 綺語抄 古来風体抄 五代歌枕 歌枕名寄
- 秀歌大体 定家八代抄