Plays

In traveller’s trim
now first he fareth forth,
and far the way is,
and many the days before him.

Describing the journey.

Mid the rocks mist-hidden
the roar of the surf resoundeth;

Whom may I friend hail
if mine own ancient comrade
I may not call thee,
O Tree of Takasago!
with whom sweet converse
to hold of long past years
beneath the snows
of many a winter white hid⁠—
for wont I have been
or night or morn, or sleeping
on my rude pallet,4
like hoary crane’s nest whiten’d
with morning moonshine,
or springtime’s rimy sparkle
like moonshine gleaming,
or waking with the daybreak,
in the murmurous music
the winds make in thy leafery
to find new gladness⁠—
so communing with my own heart
my night thoughts give me,
in utterance give me solace.

In waveless peace
the four seas lap our shores,
the gentle tide winds
no murmur mid the woods wake,
Oh, fair the age is!
fair yonder Pine-trees’ spousal,
äiöino
äiöinomatsu,
whose happy augury
men note with awe and wonder,
while vainly seek they
meet words their thanks to utter,
in such an age
that they do live rejoicing
in their Lord’s abundant bounty.

Under the protecting shadow of our wide-isled14 land do they not flourish?

A member of the chorus here recites the kuse15 or precept of the piece. Aye! and as Chônô16 hath it, all things, or quick or unquick, are revealed in song; herbs and trees and soil and sand, the whispers of the wind, the babble of the brooks⁠—all contain the soul of poetry. The sway of the woods in Spring under the eastern breezes, the chirrup of the cicada among the dews that moisten the unsunn’d foliages in Autumn, are they not forms or models of our native verse? In the universe of things that grow, doth not the Pine-tree surpass all the world of trees; bright as a full bevy of court nobles,17 the green leafery defieth a thousand autumns unshowing any change of hue⁠—well worthy, belike, the Pine-tree is of the badge of rank bestowed upon it by China’s Sovran Shikwo!18 In barbarian lands, within our own borders, by all the peoples of earth, is not the Pine-tree held blessed?

Hark! I hear
the solemn tone of Onöe’s bell
by Takasago.

Though with the daydawn
the hoarfrost shineth chilly
the Pine-tree ever
unchang’d its leafery showeth,
in the deep green shadow
or morn or evening
the fallen leaves we sweep,
yet ever fall they,
for true it is that never
yon leafery perisheth,
and ages long endureth
the Pine-tree’s greenery
as wild moor-creeper endless,
among the trees
that keep their freshness ever
deathless the fame is
of the Pine of Takasago
for ay a symbol,
äiöinomatsu,
and sign of wedded joyance.

In this our land
our mighty Sovran ruleth
beneath his sway
’tis good to live21 forever,
and Sumiyoshi
where fair it is to dwell
our wanderer fain
would seek, and humbly there
the god await⁠—
wherefore ’tis now he climbeth
on fisher’s bark
anigh the sea-marge floateth,
and forth he fareth
by favouring breezes wafted,
across the waters
the evening waters fareth.

From Takasago
on fisher’s bark I climb
and sail away
far o’er the waves of ocean
as the pale moon riseth,
under Awaji’s shadow
I cleave the waters
’yond roaring Naruwo faring,
till Sumiyoshi
I reach, fair Sumiyoshi!

Entering.22

From the western sea
from where the waves are breaking
upon Aoki⁠—23

cometh the holy Presence,
in this fair spring-tide
when the Tree Divine full flourisheth,
and still the snows lie
lightly on As’kagata⁠—24

where men do gather
on the strand rich seaweed harvest⁠—

at foot of the ancient Pine-tree
I will recline me⁠—

with a thousand years’ green leafery
his25 hands full filled be⁠—

and spray of plum-tree gathered
my head adorning⁠—

like latest snows of winter
the blossoms deck him.

The virgin voices,
how clear is their music
beneath the Pine-tree
of bright-shored Suminoye,
as featly dance they
to the air of the “Blue Sea Wave”
by the blue sea where
the shadow is reflected
of the Princess Pine-tree.

The way of god and Sovran
towards City-Royal
will now be straightway wended26
this fair spring season⁠—

’Tis the Dance of “Joyeuse Rentrée”

for years ten thousand

in ritual vestments

let arms extended
all ill fend from the land,
and arms fair-folded
embrace all happiness,
and make the folk glad
with the “Joy of a Thousand Autumns,”
long life give all men
with the “Joy of a Myriad Years”⁠—
äiöinomatsu
among the Wedded Pine-trees
growing old together
may gentle winds forever
wake music ever haunting
and ever the world enchanting!27

O this is strange! First let me see the letter. She reads.

“Now these many months I have been sore grieved to look upon thy wretched state, and so I have sold myself to a Child Merchant, and am going Eastward⁠ ⁠… ⁠ ⁠…

Stay, what is this? My child was not for such as they⁠ ⁠… The Merchant has disappeared. Ah! Woe is me, he is gone, and lost from sight. What can this mean Reading.

“and now I pray thee to make of this an occasion to retire from the world, and change thy garb.29 A thousand times do I regret that I must part from thee.”

Why, if the parting is bitter, dost leave
thy mother, not stay by her side?
The mother in her humble cot
grieving alone
day in, day out,
and naught to comfort her
but the sight of her son.

O Thou in whom I put my faith,
Lady-of-the-Trees-that-Blossom,30
to Thee he’s dedicate.
Canst thou not stay him,
my Sakura, my Flower?

For otherwise
how can I live the weary days alone,
in this old home where grief has come to me?
I will seek out whither my child has gone,
she cries and weeping, weeping wanders forth.

I am a priest of the temple of Isobe in Hitachi. This youth has begged me to take him under my care, so we have made a vow of teacher and disciple. In this district is the Sakuragawa, famous for its blossoms; and as the flowers are now at the best, I am taking him with me, and we are hastening thither.

Indeed they are. And there is another sight to see. A mad woman, with a beautiful hand-net, with which she scoops up the blossoms floating on the stream. And her ravings are most strange and diverting. Wait here a little, and we will show her to this youth.

Tell me, O Wayfarer, are the blossoms falling on
the Sakuragawa?

This is the famous river, the Sakuragawa. In truth a lovely place that well deserves its name. The child from whom I am parted is also named Sakura, and this remembrance and the season both make dear to me this river with the name I love and where

Parted the parent and child,
the bird has flown from the nest,
whither I know not.
And I have travelled far, worn out am I
with this my journey through the wilds,
distant as earth from sky.
But what if we should meet, mother and son,
and neither know the other’s face?
Nay, nay, it cannot be!
Through the dark winter he was lost from view,
but now the Spring has come
shall he not blossom out again,
my Flower?

Oh! Admirable Reason! True indeed
a Cause there is to each Result,34
and this has brought thee up from Tsukushi
far Eastward to the cherry river here.

This river for its very distance famed.
What says the verse than Tsurayuki made?

’Tis true, for Tsurayuki sang of old,
hearing that in a land he had not seen,

in Hitachi, there ran a stream men call

The River of Blossoms, the Sakuragawa,

Methinks, when Spring has come,
The waters rise, and ever beat the waves,
More than their wont upon the banks
Of the River of Blossoms.

Today the Flowers and the Poet too
have vanished like the snow, and left
only a name behind; the river still
flows on and shallow after shallow bears
its foaming blossom where the waves beat white.
⋮

What sayest thou? The evening breeze
down from the mountains brings the blooms?
’Tis well. I’ll catch them in my net
before they float away.

See, see, the blast from the hills
on every tree top beating down,

the flood of flowers rising white

and the waves that break from above.

Are they blossoms?

Are they snow?

Are they waves?

Are they flowers?

The hovering clouds

by the river breeze

are scattered and the waves flow on,
waves of the River of Blossoms,
let me catch them as they pass!
⋮
The waters flow,36 the flowers fall,
forever lasts the Spring.
The moon shines cold, the wind blows high,
the cranes do not fly home.
The flowers that grow in the rocks
are scarlet, and light up the stream.
The trees that grow by the caverns
are green and contain the breeze.
The blossoms open like brocade,
the brimming pools are deep and blue.

My straying footsteps brought me here

to the river that rouses a longing within.
“The shade of a tree,37 the flow of a stream”⁠—
Alike the name, alike the place,
they must be together bound
by a Link of former Life.

The water is the mirror of the flowers,
but as the year grows old
and blossoms fade and fall,
then can ye say the mirror tarnisheth?
What shall we do,
well knowing that the blossoms fade
and later turn to dust?
’Tis vain to hold
them blossoms which in truth are dreams.
For from the treetops
scattered and come to naught they fall,
fall on the waters, and, alas,
vanish as bubbles and are gone.
What looked like clouds
were the swift eddies and the silent pools
of blossoms on Miyoshino.
⋮
But though I catch them in my net,
the cherries, the flowers, the clouds and the waves,
are but the blossoms from the trees.
Not these indeed I seek,
but my beloved son,
not these indeed, but my beloved son,
my Sakura, my Flower.
⋮

Strange, O how strange
are this mad woman’s words to hear!
Comest thou perchance from Tsukushi?

Why dost thou ask this thing of me,
whom none until today have known,
whether I come from Tsukushi?

Why should we hide it from thee? Lo!
The bloom of love that doth not fade!
Behold thy Sakura.

That name I hear⁠—
Is it a dream? I cannot tell⁠—
Which is my child?

The days of three long years have passed
and many a league has lain between
Mother and Son,

and his form has changed.

But on that familiar face

looking with earnest gaze I see
the bright and blooming countenance
of Sakura, my blossom!
⋮

Announcing himself.

And you may be quite right about Genji’s having lived here. That blossom will flare in a moment.41

Telling out Genji’s thoughts.

I was made esquire at twelve, with the hat. The soothsayers unrolled my glories.43 I was called Hikaru Genji. I was chujo in Hahakigi province. I was chujo in the land of the maple-feasting.44 At twenty-five I came to Suma, knowing all sorrow of seafare, having none to attend my dreams, no one to hear the old stories.

Then I was recalled to the city. I passed from office to office. I was naidaijin in Miwotsukushi, I was dajodaijin in the lands of Otome, and daijotenno in Fuji no Uraba; for this I was called Hikam Kimi.

To Waki.

How beautiful this sea is! When I trod the grass here I was called “Genji the gleaming,” and now from the vaulting heaven I reach down to set a magic on mortals. I sing of the moon in this shadow, here on this sea-marge of Suma. Here I will dance Sei-kai-ha, the blue dance of the sea waves.

And then he begins to dance.

Accompanying and describing the dance.

My name is known to the world;
Here by the white waves was my dwelling;
But I am come down out of sky
To put my glamour on mortals.

Gracious is the presence of Genji,
It is like the feel of things at Suma.

Referring also to a change in the dance.

The wind is abated.

—clings to the clear-blown sky.
It seems like the springtime.

He came down like Brahma, Indra, and the Four Kings visiting the abode of Devas and Men.46
He, the soul of the place.47
He, who seemed but a woodman,
He flashed with the honoured colours,
He the true-gleaming.
Blue-grey is the garb they wear here,
Blue-grey he fluttered in Suma;
His sleeves were like the grey sea-waves;
They moved with curious rustling,
Like the noise of the restless waves,
Like the bell of a country town
’Neath the nightfall.

There never was anybody heard of Mount Shinobu but had a kindly feeling for it; so I, like any other priest that might want to know a little bit about each one of the provinces, may as well be walking up here along the much travelled road.

I have not yet been about the east country, but now I have set my mind to go as far as the earth goes; and why shouldn’t I, after all? seeing that I go about with my heart set upon no particular place whatsoever, and with no other man’s flag in my hand, no more than a cloud has. It is a flag of the night I see coming down upon me. I wonder now, would the sea be that way, or the little place Kefu that they say is stuck down against it?

Tangled, we are entangled. Whose fault was it, dear? tangled up as the grass patterns are tangled up in this coarse cloth, or as the little Mushi that lives on and chirrups in dried seaweed. We do not know where are today our tears in the undergrowth of this eternal wilderness. We neither wake nor sleep, and passing our nights in a sorrow which is in the end a vision, what are these scenes of spring to us? This thinking in sleep of someone who has no thought of you, is it more than a dream? and yet surely it is the natural way of love. In our hearts there is much and in our bodies nothing, and we do nothing at all, and only the waters of the river of tears flow quickly.

Narrow is the cloth of Kefu, but wild is that river, that torrent of the hills, between the beloved and the bride.

The cloth she had woven is faded, the thousand one hundred nights were night-trysts watched out in vain.

Not recognizing the nature of the speakers.

This is a narrow cloth called “Hosonuno,”
It is just the breadth of the loom.

And this is merely wood painted,
And yet the place is famous because of these things.
Would you care to buy them from us?

These names are surely a byword.
As the cloth Hosonuno is narrow of weft,
More narrow than the breast,
We call by this name any woman
Whose breasts are hard to come nigh to.
It is a name in books of love.

A thousand wands were in vain.
A sad name, set in a story.

A seedpod void of the seed,
We had no meeting together.

I will go to that love-cave,
It will be a tale to take back to my village.
Will you show me my way there?

Here are the pair of them
Going along before the traveller.

We have spent the whole day until dusk
Pushing aside the grass
From the overgrown way at Kefu,
And we are not yet come to the cave.
O you there, cutting grass on the hill,
Please set your mind on this matter.
“You’d be asking where the dew is
While the frost’s lying here on the road.
Who’d tell you that now?”
Very well then don’t tell us,
But be sure we will come to the cave.

There’s a cold feel in the autumn.
Night comes.⁠ ⁠…

And storms; trees giving up their leaf,
Spotted with sudden showers.
Autumn! our feet are clogged
In the dew-drenched, entangled leaves.
The perpetual shadow is lonely,
The mountain shadow is lying alone.
The owl cries out from the ivies
That drag their weight on the pine.
Among the orchids and chrysanthemum flowers
The hiding fox is now lord of that love-cave,
Nishidzuka,
That is dyed like the maple’s leaf.
They have left us this thing for a saying.
That pair have gone into the cave.

Restless.

He performs the gestures of a ritual.

Aie! honoured priest!
You do not dip twice in the river
Beneath the same tree’s shadow
Without bonds in some other life.
Hear sooth-say,
Now is there meeting between us,
Between us who were until now
In life and in afterlife kept apart.
A dream-bridge over wild grass,
Over the grass I dwell in.
O honoured! do not awake me by force.
I see that the law is perfect.

Supposedly invisible.

The three years are over and past:
All that is but an old story.

To dream under dream we return.
Three years.⁠ ⁠… And the meeting comes now!
This night has happened over and over,
And only now comes the tryst.

Look there to the cave
Beneath the stems of the Suzuki.
From under the shadows of the love-grass,
See, see how they come forth and appear
For an instant.⁠ ⁠… Illusion!

There is at the root of hell
No distinction between princes and commons;
Wretched for me! ’tis the saying.

Strange, what seemed so very old a cave
Is all glittering-bright within,
Like the flicker of fire.
It is like the inside of a house.
They are setting up a loom,
And heaping up charm-sticks. No,
The hangings are out of old time.
Is it illusion, illusion?

Our hearts have been in the dark of the falling snow,
We have been astray in the flurry.
You should tell better than we
How much is illusion;
You who are in the world.
We have been in the whirl of those who are fading.

Indeed in old times Narihira said,
—and he has vanished with the years⁠—
“Let a man who is in the world tell the fact.”
It is for you, traveller,
To say how much is illusion.

Let it be a dream, or a vision,
Or what you will, I care not.
Only show me the old times over-past and snowed under⁠—
Now, soon, while the night lasts.

Look then, the old times are shown,
Faint as the shadow-flower shows in the grass that bears it;
And you’ve but a moon for lantern.

The woman has gone into the cave.
She sets up her loom there
For the weaving of Hosonuno,
Thin as the heart of Autumn.

The suitor for his part, holding his charm-sticks,
Knocks on a gate which was barred.

In old time he got back no answer,
No secret sound at all
Save.⁠ ⁠…

It was a sweet sound like katydids and crickets,
A thin sound like the Autumn.

Kiri.

Hatari.

Cho.

Cho.

Mimicking the sound of crickets.

Let be, they make grass-cloth in Kefu,
Kefu, the land’s end, matchless in the world.

That is an old custom, truly,
But this priest would look on the past.

The good priest himself would say:
Even if we weave the cloth, Hosonuno,
And set up the charm-sticks
For a thousand, a hundred nights,
Even then our beautiful desire will not pass,
Nor fade nor die out.

Even today the difficulty of our meeting is remembered,
And is remembered in song.

That we may acquire power,
Even in our faint substance,
We will show forth even now,
And though it be but in a dream,
Our form of repentance.
Explaining the movement of the Shite and Tsure.
There he is carrying wands,
And she has no need to be asked.
See her within the cave,
With a cricket-like noise of weaving.
The grass-gates and the hedge are between them;
That is a symbol.
Night has already come on.
Now explaining the thoughts of the man’s spirit.
Love’s thoughts are heaped high within him,
As high as the charm-sticks,
As high as the charm-sticks, once coloured,
Now fading, lie heaped in this cave.
And he knows of their fading. He says:
I lie a body, unknown to any other man,
Like old wood buried in moss.
It were a fit thing
That I should stop thinking the love-thoughts.
The charm-sticks fade and decay,
And yet,
The rumour of our love
Takes foot and moves through the world.
We had no meeting
But tears have, it seems, brought out a bright blossom
Upon the dyed tree of love.

Tell me, could I have foreseen
Or known what a heap of my writings
Should lie at the end of her shaft-bench?

A hundred nights and more
Of twisting, encumbered sleep,
And now they make it a ballad,
Not for one year or for two only
But until the days lie deep
As the sand’s depth at Kefu,
Until the year’s end is red with Autumn,
Red like these love-wands,
A thousand nights are in vain.
And I stand at this gate-side.
You grant no admission, you do not show yourself
Until I and my sleeves are faded.
By the dew-like gemming of tears upon my sleeve,
Why will you grant no admission?
And we all are doomed to pass,
You, and my sleeves and my tears.
And you did not even know when three years had come to an end.
Cruel, ah cruel!
The charm-sticks.⁠ ⁠…

Were set up a thousand times;
Then, now, and for always.

Happy at last and well-starred,
Now comes the eve of betrothal:
We meet for the wine-cup.

How glorious the sleeves of the dance,
That are like snow-whirls!

Tread out the dance and bring music.
This dance is for Nishikigi.

This dance is for the evening plays,
And for the weaving.

For the tokens between lover and lover:
It is a reflecting in the wine-cup.

Ari-aki,
The dawn!
Come, we are out of place;
Let us go ere the light comes.
To the Waki.
We ask you, do not awake,
We all will wither away,
The wands and this cloth of a dream.
Now you will come out of sleep,
You tread the border and nothing
Awaits you: no, all this will wither away.
There is nothing here but this cave in the field’s midst.
Today’s wind moves in the pines;
A wild place, unlit, and unfilled.

We left the capital, took a boat at ripple-kissing Shiga no Ura to cross the lake; then passed over Arichi no Yama Hill, and reached the Tamaye bridge studded with the jewel-dews. We loitered by the singing shade of the Shiwokoshi pine-tree at Adaka, whose smoke-like leaves were ruffled by the evening wind; we climbed the highest point of Tonami Mountain as keen as the Buddha’s law that will cut asunder our sins. But our goal is still remote underneath the dim clouds. Oh, how far behind is the capital!⁠ ⁠…

Now we arrived at Sakaigawa.

I am Kumagai no Naozane, a man of the country of Musashi. I have left my home and call myself the priest Rensei; this I have done because of my grief at the death of Atsumori, who fell in battle by my hand. Hence it comes that I am dressed in priestly guise.

And now I am going down to Ichi-no-Tani to pray for the salvation of Atsumori’s soul.

He walks slowly across the stage, singing a song descriptive of his journey.

I have come so fast that here I am already at Ichi-no-Tani, in the country of Tsu.

Truly the past returns to my mind as though it were a thing of today.

But listen! I hear the sound of a flute coming from a knoll of rising ground. I will wait here till the flute-player passes, and ask him to tell me the story of this place.

They that were reaping,
Reaping on that hill,
Walk now through the fields
Homeward, for it is dusk.

Unlooked for from men of our condition, you say!
Have you not read:⁠—
“Do not envy what is above you
Nor despise what is below you”?
Moreover the songs of woodmen and the flute-playing of herdsmen,
Flute-playing even of reapers and songs of wood-fellers
Through poets’ verses are known to all the world.
Wonder not to hear among us
The sound of a bamboo-flute.

You are right. Indeed it is as you have told me.
Songs of woodmen and flute-playing of herdsmen⁠ ⁠…

These are the pastimes that each chooses to his taste.
Of floating bamboo-wood
Many are the famous flutes that have been made;
Little-Branch and Cicada-Cage,
And as for the reaper’s flute,
Its name is Green-leaf;
On the shore of Sumiyoshi
The Korean flute they play.
And here on the shore of Suma
On Stick of the Salt-kilns
The fishers blow their tune.

Namu Amidabu.

Praise to Amida Buddha!

“Oh, reject me not!
One cry suffices for salvation,
Yet day and night
Your prayers will rise for me.
Happy am I, for though you know not my name,
Yet for my soul’s deliverance
At dawn and dusk henceforward I know that you will pray.”

Would you know who I am
That like the watchmen at Suma Pass
Have wakened at the cry of seabirds roaming
Upon Awaji shore?
Listen, Rensei. I am Atsumori.

As the sea by a rocky shore,
Yet should I be salved by prayer.

This too must spring
From kindness of a former life.48

There is a saying, “Put away from you a wicked friend; summon to your side a virtuous enemy.” For you it was said, and you have proven it true.

And now come tell with us the tale of your confession, while the night is still dark.

He49 bids the flowers of Spring
Mount the treetop that men may raise their eyes
And walk on upward paths;
He bids the moon in autumn waves be drowned
In token that he visits laggard men
And leads them out from valleys of despair.

Now the clan of Taira, building wall to wall,
Spread over the earth like the leafy branches of a great tree:

Yet their prosperity lasted but for a day;
It was like the flower of the convolvulus.
There was none to tell them50
That glory flashes like sparks from flint-stone,
And after⁠—darkness.
Oh wretched, the life of men!

When they were on high they afflicted the humble;
When they were rich they were reckless in pride.
And so for twenty years and more
They ruled this land.
But truly a generation passes like the space of a dream.
The leaves of the autumn of Juyei51
Were tossed by the four winds;
Scattered, scattered (like leaves too) floated their ships.
And they, asleep on the heaving sea, not even in dreams
Went back to home.
Caged birds longing for the clouds⁠—
Wild geese were they rather, whose ranks are broken
As they fly to southward on their doubtful journey.
So days and months went by; Spring came again
And for a little while
Here dwelt they on the shore of Suma
At the first valley.52
From the mountain behind us the winds blew down
Till the fields grew wintry again.
Our ships lay by the shore, where night and day
The seagulls cried and salt waves washed on our sleeves.
We slept with fishers in their huts
On pillows of sand.
We knew none but the people of Suma.
And when among the pine-trees
The evening smoke was rising,
Brushwood, as they call it,53
Brushwood we gathered
And spread for carpet.
Sorrowful we lived
On the wild shore of Suma,
Till the clan Taira and all its princes
Were but villagers of Suma.

But on the night of the sixth day of the second month
My father Tsunemori gathered us together.
“Tomorrow,” he said, “we shall fight our last fight.
Tonight is all that is left us.”
We sang songs together, and danced.

Yes, I remember; we in our siege-camp
Heard the sound of music
Echoing from your tents that night;
There was the music of a flute⁠ ⁠…

Singing to one measure.

Atsumori dances.

First comes the Royal Boat.

The whole clan has put its boats to sea.
He54 will not be left behind;
He runs to the shore.
But the Royal Boat and the soldiers’ boats
Have sailed far away.

What can he do?
He spurs his horse into the waves.
He is full of perplexity.
And then

Atsumori rises from the ground and advances toward the Priest with uplifted sword.