404
Are you a doll bride
Made of ferns
From the Hakone Hills,
Coming to bed
With your sash so tightly knotted?
(3370)
405
Who can behold
The maiden
Bleaching cloth
In the crystal Tama waters
And not be smitten?
(3373)
406
To what shall I compare
My dear lover?
He's a graceful aster bloom,
Which, like the stars of the sky, adorns
The boundless Musashi Plain all the year.
(3379)
407
Would I had a horse
That could run without sound.
I'd ride across
The bridge of cleft boards
And oft visit my sweet love.
(3387)
408
Heaving great sighs,
He can no more pass by your house
Than mist avoid a mountaintop.
Hey, lass, why not let him in,
Lie with him, and let him go.
(3388)
409
I will wove
To the darling of my heart,
Till the gate of her house
Disappears from view
Behind the hill.
(3389)
410
As Mt. Tsukuba
is always in view
So I'm under the constant gaze
Of my mother's wary eyes.
For all that, our souls met.
(3393)
411
As water plummets
Down the sheer cliff
Of Mt. Tsukuba,
Roaring and foaming,
So wild is my love.
(3392)
412
Like seeing birds
Flying through the trees
Of Mt. Tsukuba,
So I see you pass,
Though once we lay together.
(3396)
413
Even if everyone
Reviled me,
What should I care,
So long as my darling
Holds me dear and writes to me?
(3398)
414
The Shinano Highway
Is a newly opened road,
Stony and rough.
Wear good, new straw sandals,
Lest you stumble.
(3399)
415
Even pebbles
In the River Chikuma
Which you tred upon
Are precious to me.
Gladly I would gather them.
(3400)
416
When my husband crossed Usui Pass,
I saw him against
The evening sun,
Waving both arms—
His heartfelt goodbye.
(3402)
417
How sweet is my darling.
Nightly lost in Love,
In my arms I clasp her tight,
Yet l never tire.
Is there a better way
I can show my love?
(3404)
418
Try hard as I may
No more can I bring the lovely girl
Closer to me
Than l can pull Mt. Tago
To me with a rope.
(3411)
419
Heedless of finding a ford,
Once I crossed a river wide
And I came upon a rapid stream.
Likewise unawares I found myself
In your tender, sturdy arms.
(3413)
420
Could I but sleep with my dear love,
Locked close in each other's arms,
Till a rainbow rises high
O'er the dike of Ikaho,
I would have no worry.
(3414)
421
As if in a dream,
Flying over the stones
Of the riverbed,
l have come to see you now.
Tell me if you Love me, dear.
(3425)
422
My dear girl in the East
Made a knot in my inner sash.
Coming to Kyushu,
I have had the knot untied
By a charming maiden.
(3427)
423
O pray, lovely maiden,
At the post house,
With horses' bells ringing,
Let me drink at the spring
From your fair cupped hands.
(3439)
The following poem is interpreted in two ways. Many scholars consider that it portrays a young man bantering with a girl for fun (version A), using euphemisms for the genital organs, while some scholars consider it a dialogue between two women (version B) arranging their children's marriage.
424 A
Hey, hey, pretty girl
Washing greens in this clear stream!
You have got a little girl in you,
I have got a Little boy in me.
They are of an age, well matched.
Would you give your girl to my boy?
424 B
There is a Lovely girl
Washing greens in this clear stream.
I, too, have a son.
They are of an age, well matched.
Would you give her for his wife?
(3440)
Woman
425
"On the fresh green fields
Near the wooded hill
I am gathering herbs,
But my basket is not full."
Her acquaintance
"Why not go picking with your dear
love?"
(3444)
426
If you Long for me,
Come, come.
I'll watch for you,
Pruning willows at the hedge
Till not a twig remains.
(3455)
427
While you serve at court
You will sleep upon the knees
Of a Lady fair.
Then remember me in the East,
who thinks of you.
(3457)
428
O my husband dear!
When you're lost to sight
Past the bend in the road,
My heart is stricken,
And I weep by the gate.
(3458)
429
When I open
The heavy gate of cypress wood
Brought from the mountain depths,
Come in quickly, silently,
So we may share the bed.
(3467)
430
"I am married,"
Oft you say to me.
But when in need,
Who does not borrow fine garments
From a neighbor?
(3472)
431
Again tonight,
My young lord
Will gently take my hands,
Roughened from pounding rice,
And be grieved.
(3459)
432
Rumors spread
If I lie with my darling.
But if I do not,
Heavy is my heart
Consumed with love.
(3466)
433
Having mown the grass,
We made a place for love
At the foot of a hill.
How sweet and lovely is she
Who demurs from our pledge of Love.
(3479)
434
The sash of my undergarment
Which won't come undone by day
Comes undone with ease at night.
Does this mean
My lover will come?
(3483)
435
The tub is full of yarn
You
have spun.
Yet tomorrow you cannot wear
Your new nice robe.
Come and rest next to me, my dear.
(3484)
436
As hemp is coiled
Fast around the grip of a bow,
So with both my arms,
I will clasp my Love in bed
Far more tightly than my rival would.
(3486)
437
Fain I'd Lie with you
Till the fresh green maple leaves
Turn to autumn tints.
What say you
To that, my dear?
(3494)
438
"No more shall I leave you
Than the snow-white clouds
Move away in the eve
From the distant hills."
So vowed my darling girl.
(3513)
439
You're a Lofty peak
Girt round by clouds.
O that I could rise
To those Lofty heights
And be at your side.
(3514)
440
Should you Lose
The memory of my face,
just behold the clouds
Over the mountain
And my image will be brought to mind.
(3515)
441
Severely rebuked
By your mother, now I go.
But before I depart, my dear,
Please appear, quickly, like a patch of blue
In a cloudy sky.
(3519)
442
It was but last night
That I Lay with my sweet love.
But it seems as distant
As a crane
Flying above the clouds.
(3522)
443
With my heart too full to speak,
Hurriedly I had to go,
Leaving her,
Like a wild bird
On a lonely pond.
(3527)
444
Departing in haste,
As waterfowl take wing,
How I rue the day
That l found no time to talk
To my dear wife before I Left.
(3528)
445
Like a stag concealed
In trees and brush,
She remains unseen,
And yet I never pass her gate
But my heart thrills with joy.
(3530)
446
When I touch my horse,
Feeding him a bit of wheat
Across a wooden stable bar,
How l yearn after that girl,
Whose smooth skin I have enjoyed but once.
(3537)
447
'Tis as great a risk
To approach another's wife
As to tie a horse
To the edge of a crumbling cliff.
Yet as ever do l breathe,
I'm smitten with her charms.
I shall risk my life for her.
(3541)
448
Little did I know
That you are the River Asuka,
With a mud-roiled stream.
O how I rue the night
When l gave myself to you!
(3544)
449
Setting my pail aside
At the public well
Shadowed by green willow trees,
Anxiously I wait for you,
Wearing a path in the ground.
(3546)
450
'Tis a delight
To yield to you.
But last night you came not.
As a rice plant in the wind,
I tossed about in bed.
(3550)
A literal translation of the first two lines reads:
I would never say no
To the pounding of rice.
The pounding of rice in a mortar with a pestle is an obvious sexual image.
451
never shall I forsake my love
And untie my sash for another,
As breakers on the shore
Gape wide
And collapse in floral foam.
(3551)
452
Would that I could be
Water flowing among rocks,
That I may flow through
The chamber where she sleeps
And enjoy a night with her.
(3554)
453
She'll never fade from my mind,
As a fishing boat
Disappears over the horizon.
Daily grows my aching love.
(3557)
454
As green weed in the sea
Waves with the tides,
So the lithe body of my love
Must toss about in bed
In her anxious wait for me.
(3562)
455
In the eulalia fields
The moon now sinks behind the hills.
The night has worn away.
She has not come yet.
Gone is the chance for a night of Love.
(3565)
Frontier guard
456
Leaving you at home,
I shall miss you constantly.
O that you were the grip
Of my bow, so I could always
Grasp you closely.
(3567)
His wife's reply
457
While I stay here
l shall pine for you.
Would I were the bow
Which you hold in your hand
When you go on morning hunts!
(3568)
The following three poems (Nos. 458 to 460) were composed by frontier guards.
458
When l left at morn
For the frontier as a guard,
My young darling wife
Cried her heart out
And would not let go of my hands.
(3569)
459
On a dusky eve
When cold mist hangs
O'er swamp reeds,
And wild geese cry in the sky,
I shall yearn for you.
(3570)
460
Again and again turning my eyes
Toward the village
Where I left my wife,
Till it was lost to sight,
l have come all this weary way.
(3571)
Footnotes
On their wedding night, a man chides his beautiful young bride.
This is considered one of the loveliest poems of the Man'yōshū, portraying a maiden's magnetic beauty.
Written on Water Page 12