It contained a particular scene where Saigyō, standing amid scattering cherry blossoms, with deep mountains off to one side and a river in front of him, composed this poem: Winds scatter white blossoms,
Whitecaps breaking on rocks;
How difficult to cross
The mountain stream.
I had envied Saigyō’s life ever since, and although I could never endure a life of ascetic hardship, I wished that I could at least renounce this life and wander wherever my feet might lead me, learning to empathize with the dew under the blossoms and to express the resentment of the scattering autumn leaves, and make out of this a record of my travels that might live on after my death. But I could not escape the grief of the three paths a woman must follow: First I obeyed my father, then I served my Lord, but my life left something still to be desired, and with each passing day I grew more averse to this sad world. [1.5] |
