Gosenshu 8

後撰和歌集　巻第八　冬

443

題しらず

Circumstance unknown

よみ人も

Also the poet

はつ時雨ふれば山べぞおもほゆるいづれの方窯づもみづらん

hatu sigure                  The first late year rain
hure-ba yamabe zo            When it falls I come to think
omohoyuru                    Of the mountain ridge.
idure no kata no             From which place does it begin
madu momidu-ran              The first leaves changing color.

--

The winter volume opens with two poems that cause several problems. The first one is that both 443 and 444 seem more appropriate to the Autumn volume than the Winter. The second is that this poem has already appeared in Volume 7 (poem 375). The placement of 443 and 444 next to each other is deliberate, since 444 works as an answer to 443. This repetition of 443 has been traditionally viewed as a mistake or a sign of hasty or incompetent editing.

Kifune and Katagiri both say these poems may have appeared here because of the sigure (late year rain) image. Sigure is found in both winter and autumn poems, although the image is more associated with winter. Perhaps the compilers were keen to start off a big set of sigure poems with poems that used hatu sigure (first late year rain), even if the poems on the whole seemed more like autumn poems. There is a clear sequence between the "first colored leaves" of this poem to the "wilted/fallen leaves" of the next poem to the start of winter in 445. Perhaps the best way to look at this is an initial set of poems that show how the sigure rains cross the seasons from autumn to fall. If the compilers were working sequentially, perhaps they initially included this poem as 375 but then later had the idea to begin winter with the 443-445. And then the current text of the GSS we have never received the final round of editing that would have removed the duplication. However, it's not impossible that the duplication was intentional.