Page:Anthology of Japanese Literature.pdf/274

270 Muromachi Period

Komachi (recostumed as her lover): My wide white skirts hitched up
Chorus: My wide white skirts hitched up
My tall black hat pulled down
And my sleeves thrown over my head
Hidden from the eyes of men on the road
In the moonlight
In the darkness coming, coming
When the night rains fell
When the night winds blew the leaves like rain
When the snow lay deep
Komachi: And the melting drops fell
One by one from the rafters
Chorus: I came and went, came and went
One night, two nights, three,
Ten (and this was the Harvest Night)
And did not see her.
Faithful as a cock that marks each dawn
I came and carved my mark upon the pillar.
I was to come a hundred nights,
I lacked but one….
Komachi: Oh, dizziness … pain….
Chorus: He was grieved at the pain in his breast
When the last night came and he died
Shii no Shosho, the Captain.
Komachi: It was his unsatisfied love possessed me so
His anger that turned my wits.
In the face of this I will pray
For life in the worlds to come
The sands of goodness I will pile
Into a towering hill.
Before the golden, gentle Buddha I will lay
Poems as my flowers
Entering in the Way
Entering in the Way.

Translated by Sam Houston Brock