Of Old Japan
"When the plum-tree blooms I shall come back"—I pondered over these words and wondered whether it would be so. I waited and waited with my eye hung to the tree. It was all in flower[1] and yet no tidings from her. I became very anxious [and at last] broke a branch and sent it to her [of course with a poem]:
You gave me words of hope, are they not long delayed?
The plum-tree is remembered by the Spring,
Though it seemed dead with frost.
She wrote back affectionate words with a poem:
Wait on, never forsake your hope,
For when the plum-tree is in flower
Even the unpromised, the unexpected, will come to you.
During the spring [of 1022] the world was disquieted.[2] My nurse, who had filled my heart with pity on that moonlight night at the ford of Matsuzato, died on the moon-birthday of the Ever-growing month [first day of March]. I lamented hopelessly without any way to set my mind at ease, and even forgot my passion for romances.
I passed day after day weeping bitterly, and when I first looked out of doors[3] [again] I saw the evening sun on cherry-blossoms all falling in confusion [this would mean four weeks later].
- ↑ Plum-trees bloom between the first and second months of the old calendar.
- ↑ By pestilence. People were often attacked by contagious diseases in those days, and they, who did not know about the nature of infection, called it by the name of "world-humor" or "world-disease," attributing its cause to the ill-humor of some gods or spirits.
- ↑ In those days windows were covered with silk and could not be seen through.
