わが庵は | wa ga io wa |
都の辰巳 | miyako no tatsumi |
しかぞ住む | shika zo sumu |
世をうぢ山と | yo wo Ujiyama to |
人はいふなり | hito wa iu nari |
Priest Kisen (喜撰法師 Kisen hōshi) or Monk Kisen is a legendary poet of early Heian period (平安時代 Heian jidai; 794−1192). The poem cited above, originally included in Kokinshū 古今集 (Collection of Early and Modern Japanese Poetry, 905), is his only known composition and therefore his only inclusion in imperial anthologies.
Nevertheless, Kisen is one the Six Poetic Immortals1 (六歌仙 Rokkasen), that is, one of the poets explicitly mentioned in Ki no Tsurayuki’s 紀貫之 (?−945; Hyakunin Isshu 35) Kanajo 仮名序 or Japanese preface to Kokinshū. There, Tsurayki writes:
Ujiyama monk Kisen is veiled, leaving us uncertain about his meaning. Reading him is like trying to keep the autumn moon is sight when a cloud obscures it before dawn. Since not many poems of his are known, we cannot study them as a group in order to evaluate him.
(trans. McCullough 1985, 7)
It is clear that no other poems attributed to Kisen were available even in the age of Kokinshū, which leads to a question of whether the poet known as Kisen actually ever lived. But if he did, the only note of his existence is the poem.
By the Mount Uji of Sorrows
The only poem attributed to priest Kisen that we know of, included among miscellaneous poems in Kokinshū, presents a baffling riddle of multiple layers and provides ground to Tsurayuki’s words in the Japanese preface of the said anthology.
The first two lines, wa ga io wa /miyako no tatsumi, are rather straightforward: my hut is southeast of the capital. But from the third line onwards, the reader is presented with a plethora of possible interpretations that today, like over a thousand years ago, remain puzzling and there is no consensus on which reading is truly correct.
Firstly, the third line shika zo sumu means like that (shika), indeed (zo), I live (sumu), but how exactly does the poet live? Looking for the answer, the reader continues further with the poem only to realise that the third line was merely the beginning of the puzzle.
The fourth line, yo wo Ujiyama to, includes a famous classical kakekotoba 掛詞 or a pivot word. In Classical Japanese orthography, the name Ujiyama 宇治山 or Mount Uji, in the eastern part of modern Uji 宇治 city near Kyoto, would have been written as Ushiyama, therefore linking it with an adjective ushi 憂し (depressing, sorrowful). And thus, the fourth line of the poem can be read as consisting of two parts, where “uji [ushi]” has two meanings, lending one to the half preceding it and another to the half following it.
世を yo wo | 憂し ushi |
| Sorrowful of the world |
| 宇治Uji [Ushi | 山 yama yama] | Mount Uji |
In the fifth line, hito wa iu, means people say or people call, while nari indicates hearsay. Therefore we can render the second half of the poem to something like I hear people call it “sorrowful of the world” Mount Uji. But such a rendition leaves us wondering of the relationship between the first and second part of the poem.
One interpretation seems to suggest that the poet lives in sorrow but another, and the more frequent one, understands that although the poet hears that people call Uji sorrowful, he lives there peacefully. This second interpretation understands wa of the last line (hito wa iu nari) as marking contrast, as indeed particle wa can do, and therefore creating this distinction between the poet and the opinion of the people.
My hut, southeast of the capital and, indeed, thus I live. But I hear people call this the sorrowful Mount Uji.
However we try to interpret this poem, it is never truly clear, and reading it feels like trying to keep the autumn moon in sight when a cloud obscures it before dawn. The beginning seems clear but as one continues, the true meaning eludes the reader and leaves one wondering, what the author meant to say.
Notes
1 Also mentioned and therefore considered one of the Six Poetic Immortals are
・Archbishop Henjō (僧正遍照 Sōjō Henjō; 816−890; Hyakunin Isshu 12);
・Ariwara no Narihira 在原業平 (825−880; Hyakunin Isshu 17)
・Fun’ya no Yasuhide 文屋康秀 (dates uncertain; Hyakunin Isshu 22)
・Ono no Komachi 小野小町 (dates uncertain; Hyakunin Isshu 9).