人はいさ

心も知らず

ふるさとは

花ぞ昔の

香に匂ひける  

きのつらゆき

ひとはいさ

こころもしらず

ふるさとは

はなぞむかしの

かににおいける

Ki no Tsurayuki

The heart of man indeed

Is hard to fathom,

But in my birthplace

Plum blossoms still smell

As in years gone by.

Hokusai

Ki no Tsurayuki (868 - 946) was a great poet, author, and courtier of the Heian period. He was governor at several provinces. In 905 emperor Daigo chose him as the chief compiler of the Kokinshu. His major literary work was the Tosa nikki, the Tosa Diary (it was written anonymously, and in hiragana; at the beginning of this diary he pretended to be a woman but his writing suggested the real author was male). He is one of the Thirty-Six Immortal Poets.

His preface to the Kokinshu is the first critical essay on poetry. 原文

作者略伝と語釈

Tsurayuki by Kikuchi Yosai

From the poem’s headnote in the Kokinshu:

“There was a house of someone with whom the poet stayed whenever he made a pilgrimage to Hatsuse. However, for a long time he did not have occasion to stay there. Time passed, and later, when he did finally visit again, the owner of the house sent out the following upon his arrival: ‘As you can see, your house is right here where it has always been!’ Whereupon the poet broke off a branch of a plum that had been planted there and recited this poem.”

Tsurayuki’s friend replied with his own poem:

Even the flowers greet you as of old;

   Then you may well divine in what degree

My heart has a welcome for my old friend -

   It was I who planted the tree!

It is traditionally believed that this poem was addressed to another man, so there is possibly a homoerotic intent in the poem, also because the plum blossom is mentioned in Saikaku’s Nanshoku Okagami, Great Mirror of Male Love, where a young man is said to be ‘as obedient and true as a plum blossom’.

Hatsuse is now called Hasedera. The Hasedera temple was a popular, but exhausting, pilgrimage for Heian ladies, and a stop for other pilgrims on their way to the Grand Shrine at Ise. Hatsuse is also mentioned in the Tale of Genji.

Hokusai’s drawing shows us the arrival of the friend. The porters are unpacking his luggage. A mason is preparing an other house for the spring season.

Plum blossom