KKS 9
Text
雪の降けるをよめる
Read on falling snow
紀貫之
霞たちこのめもはるの雪降れば花なき里も花ぞ散りける
|
kasumi tachi |
The mist rises |
Notes
- Buds
- konome haru is a kakekotoba (pivot word), with haru meaning both "[buds] grow forth" and "spring".
Other sources:
Analysis
The early spring poems continue with the connection between white snow and the coming plum blossoms. Matsuda notes the close connection between poems 7-9: snow falls on branches, on the poet's head, and in a far off village, and in all three cases suggests something else that isn't there.
A common technique of the early KKS poems is to first introduce spring imagery by its absence. The first introduction of the spring haze is in Poem 3, in the context of the poet not knowing where it is. Poem 4 introduces the warbler by its absence. The main focus of this poem is the same confusion of flowers and snow that is found in several other poems, but Tsurayuki's construction is somewhat different. Fujiwara no Norinaga (12th c.) noted that Tsurayuki often pairs images that are there (snow, in this case) with images that are not really there (the flowers, in this case). Norinaga found this technique so excellent that he declared Tsurayuki was fit to be placed alongside Hitomaro -- a declaration that shows the high respect Tsurayuki garnered by the 12th century.
Tsuneyori (Ryōdo Kikigaki) found in this poem an expression of the ruler's beneficence, but snow would not be a common expression of that theme. Katagiri noted how unusual it was that even Keichū said that this poem might have such a reading.
The first two lines are thought by most commentators to be jo (poetic preface), although one that contributes meaning to the poem. All modern commentators except Kaneko(1927) and Matsuda(1968) believe the haze is not actually there; it's just providing a spring image to begin the poem. Kaneko and Matsuda are also the only ones who says that the "village" is Tsurayuki's own garden or house.
Takeoka points out the repeated use of short subject-predicate phrases, giving the poem a prose-like quality and a staccato rhythm.
