{"collection":"shi","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/shi/msj/msj07.htm","path":"shi/msj/msj07.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/shi/msj/msj07.htm","text":"The Master-Singers of Japan, by Clara A. Walsh, [1914]\nOhotomo no Sukune Yakamochi was a noble of the Ohotomo clan. He held high rank at Court, being made Daishi\u2014great teacher\u2014an honour conferred upon learned and virtuous persons. To him probably is due the collection of poems of the \" Many\u00f4shiu \"\u2014to which his own poems form a considerable an valuable contribution. He died September 785 A.D. Professor Dickins says, \"His poetical correspondence with Ikenushi is a most interesting example of the literary life of the court and official world of the eighth century.\"\nMay 19th, 750 A.D.\nSee the fair maid expectant stand,\n All in the golden morning light.\n Mirror-case held in tiny hand,\n Whose lids have veiled its surface bright.\n Peach-tinted cheeks and smile-curved brows,\n Graceful as arching willow boughs.\nOn the high twin peaks of the hill,\n Through the mist-scattered deep green vales,\n Loud rings the cuckoo's note and clear,\n Or near the moonlit moorland wails.\n Darts he through rippling fuji-blooms,\n Through the wing-shaken perfumed showers\n Of scattered petals. Thence I cull\n A fragrant spray of well-loved flowers.\nThe purple wavelets in my sleeve\n I place\u2014and if, all fair to see\n Yet they should stain its surface bright,\n What care I? Purple let it be!\nWHICH HE WOULD FAIN SEND TO HIS WIFE, AT THE ROYAL CITY\nBy Yakamochi\u2014June 5th, A.D. 749\nIn the great Sea-god Susu's realm\n The divers brave the awful deep,\n There the awabi's gleaming pearls\n Pluck from the shadows where they sleep.\nWould that a hundred pearls were mine,\n Hundreds of gleaming orbs to twine\n And send to thee, where thou dost pine\n In Royal City desolate!\n Where the nights pass in dreary round,\n And thou, with tresses all unbound,\n The days of parting countest!\n Lonely our alcove\u2014still apart\n Our sleeves\u2014and thou with weary heart\u2014\n The creeping days, thou countest?\nPearls I would send, that thou shouldst find\n Solace in twining them to hind\n Garlands of orange-blossom white,\n Dark leaves with golden fruit alight,\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0And sweet-flag flowers,\n In this fifth moon-month when by day\n And night the cuckoo sings his lay.\n(Last Lay of the \"Many\u00f4shiu\")\nBy Yakamochi\u2014New Year's Day, Feb. 2nd, A.D. 759\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u2019Tis the New Year.\n Already dawneth Spring, with promise bright.\n On our dear Land may countless blessings light,\n As countless as the snowflakes that are falling!\n(Part of Lay 232, \"Many\u00f4shiu\")\nBy Yakamochi\u2014July 16th, A.D. 749\nTo soothe my heart, afar from thee,\n A wild pink from the green hillside\n I planted in my garden court.\n Then, for its flower-spouse I brought\n A lily from the moorland wide.\n So should their hues and fragrance be\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Together mingled.\nAs side by side, I watch them grow,\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0It calms my sorrow,\n Else, heaven-far from thee, I know\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I could not, could not stay\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0One more brief day,\n But fain must seek thee on the morrow!\nBy Yakamochi\u2014June 2nd, A.D. 750\nWithin thy garden lies\n A sheltered dell where alders grow,\n From thence to morning skies\n The cuckoo's notes unceasing flow,\n And every eve, far, far away\n Among the Fuji trails\n Purple with bloom, his roundelay\n Of joyance never fails.\n But in my garden here,\n Though orange-flowers unwithered blow,\n No cuckoo ventures near,\n Nor song doth he bestow!\n Why tells he to thine ear?\n The tale I may not know\nPart of Lay Sent to his Wife in the Capital\nFrom friends and kin apart,\n In lonely wilds I pined,\n And solace to my heart,\n A-hawking sought to find.\n Ihas\u00e9's moor towards\n Where the bush-clover grows,\n Over the Autumn sward\n Gaily my party goes.\n Men through the wooded dells\n Beating for wild-fowl press,\n While my hawk's silver bells\n Tinkle with eagerness.\n With that sweet music near,\n Gazing on wide-spread view,\n Gone are my musings drear,\n Gladness is born anew!\n Now in our chamber here,\n Where our twin-pillows lie,\n My dappled falcon dear\n Perches his master nigh.\n Here dainty hits I bring,\n Here smooth his mottled wing!\n(Lay 238 from the Many\u00f4shiu\")\nBy Yakamochi\u2014April 20th, A.D. 750\nSince that far day when Heaven and Earth were new,\n Plain to mankind hath been the certainty\n That this our world is all impermanence.\n Gaze on the heavens, and mark the gleaming moon,\n That ever waxes, evermore to wane.\n The steep hillsides, tree-clad, flow's-wreathed Spring,\n Are fair with blossom; but the Autumn comes,\n The cold dew falls, and hoar-frosts\u2019 searing touch\n Sets the hillside aflame with ruddy leaves\u2014\n The red leaf falls, and leaves the branches bare!\n So with mankind. Too soon the youthful cheek\n Loses its freshness, and the jetty hair\n Changes its shining darkness into grey.\n The smiling morn turns to the tearful eve,\n As the wind blows, unseen of mortal eye.\n As the tide flows, nor for an instant stays;\n So all things pass, and all are mutable,\n And I\u2014I weep, and cannot stay my tears!\nTogether dwelt my Lady-wife and I,\n And with the years so grew our mutual love,\n While each new Spring, when on the earliest flowers\n We gazed together, so in form and soul\n She seemed to draw new loveliness herself\n From their young beauty\u2014Wife! so far from me!\n When, in obedience to my Sov\u2019reign Lord,\n I crossed through frowning passes thick with trees,\n And o\u2019er wild moors, to frontiers heaven-far.\n Since we were parted, months have come and gone,\n The cherry-flowers have bloomed and passed away,\n And thou, sweet wife! not one short glimpse of thee\n My heart has gladdened! Sorrowful and wan\n Each night my sleeve I backward turn, if so\n Haply in dreams to see thee! Yet I would\n Thy very self, and not thy dream-form see.\n Would I could seek thee, and the long night through\n Make thy white arm my pillow.\u2014But alas!\n Long lie the spear-ways, as a barrier\n Parting us, till a happier time be ours!\n Ay! when the cuckoo blithely singing comes,\n In his own month (ah t would that it were here!)\nWhen all the hills are white with hare-bush blooms,\n Then shall I gaze across the shining space\n Of Omi's waters, to our distant home;\n Nara, the City-Royal, and our home!\n Like the sad Nuy\u00e9 bird, impatient too,\n I shall set forth, my eager heart and soul\n One great glad longing for the sight of thee!\n Sight of thee standing in our doorway dear,\n Listening to passing words as oracles,\n Searching with earnest gaze the distant road\n (Sad, at the evening shadows lengthening)\n For me who come apace to meet my love?\nBy Yakamochi\nWritten when ill, in answer to Letter and Verses from his Friend Ikenushi, April 8th, A.D. 748\nFair is the land in waning Spring,\n The light wind passes like a sigh,\n Swift through the blue on sweeping wing\n The swallow, clay in beak, goes by.\n Gladly he darts through shadowing leaves\n To his house-building \u2019neath the eaves.\n To the wide ocean far away\n The wild geese, reeds in bill, take flight,\n Streaming across the moonlit bay\n Through the vast silence of the night.\nYou write, \"I sing, where old friends throng,\n New songs, and, duly purified, I drink and pass the cup along,\n Adrift upon the crystal tide.\"\n Glad would I join your feast. Alas!\n Weak from disease I may not pass\n To revel by your side!\nBoldly the white plum-blossoms raise\n Their fragrant beauty through the haze\n Of winter gloom, where sleet and snow\n Contending, round my dwelling blow.\nA hero's fame should so established stand,\n That through the endless ages yet to be\n His name should thrill, inspiriting and grand,\n Upon the lips of far posterity!\nIn dread obeisance thy way\n To distant Marchlands didst thou wend,\n O\u2019er craggy hill and barren waste;\n A loyal liege-man thou, O friend!\n \u2019Tis true thou liest all alone\n On bed of sickness close-confined,\n Full of sad thoughts, but such the way\n Of this poor world, time beyond mind!\n What say our neighbours, that may cheer\n Thy saddened thoughts, beloved friend!\n They say, on all the hillsides bloom\n The sprays of cherry, that down-bend\n With shining blossom \u2019mid whose snows\n Ceaseless the warblers\u2019 love-lilts ring,\n While o\u2019er the moorland wander maids\n Plucking the violets of Spring;\n Neatly they fold their shining sleeves,\n Lift their red skirts above the dew,\n And wait with heartfelt sympathy,\n For thee to pluck the flowers anew.\n Cheer thee, O brother, Spring is young,\n And ere it fades, thou yet shalt share\n The revels of its blossom-time,\n The fragrance of its perfumed air!","title":"The Master-Singers of Japan: IV.","type":"page"}