Gosenshu 4

Gosen wakashu Volume 4: Summer 後撰和歌集巻第四　夏

147

題しらず

Circumstance unknown

よみ人も

Also the poet

今日よりは夏の衣に成りぬれどきるひとさへはかはらざりけり

kehu yori ha                  It's from today that
natu no koromo ni             We begin to wear
nari-nure-do                  The summer clothing,
kiru hito sahe                But the heart of the wearers,
kahara-zari-keri              Alone does not change, I see.

--

As the weather gets hotter, people change to lighter summer clothing. Katagiri notes that the focus on the hearts of people is characteristic of the GSS, but it's hard to say exactly what the meaning is. The use of hito suggests a love poem with a woman complaining about a man, as in Kigin's reading. But perhaps because this is the opposite of the usual changing hearts of men, Kifune says that the hito is actually the poet herself, and it's her sorrow that doesn't change. Katagiri seems to take this in a more general sense -- people's hearts are not like the light clothing we change into, and thus stay the same.

The love meaning is more evident in Shoku kokin wakashu 1542, which uses this as a honka:

今日見れば夏の衣になりにけりうきはかはらぬ身をいかにせん

Today I see that people have changed to summer clothing. What will happen to my sorrowful heart which does not change?

It's hard to tell what this means for the medieval reading of the poem since it was common to use a non-love poem as a honka for a love poem.

A similar feeling is found in SIS 1002, though about spring:

あたらしき年にはあれども鶯の鳴く音さへには変わらざりけり

It's a new year, but it seems that only the sound of the warbler has not changed.

This poem appears in the Teiji Poetry Contest. Emperor Daigo himself was the judge. This poem lost, Daigo commenting negatively on the fourth line.