How terrible that anyone could be so burdened with grief. It was a dreary, rainy day in the fourth month, yet I heard the song of the first cuckoo from its leafy perch among the trees on Mount Otowa:

May the cuckoo’s first song
Banish my tears and easy
My burdened heart under
A lowering sky at dawn. [2.12]

sad girl



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From The Confessions of Lady Nijō, translated by Karen Brazell - About this site