Diaries of Court Ladies of Old Japan

She had meant to send the last poem only to the Prince, but when she learned that it was His Highness himself who had come she sent all.

The Prince read and did not feel that his visit had been in vain, if she also had been awake and sadly dreaming. He wrote promptly and the letter was presented while she was gazing aimlessly. She opened it anxiously and read:

First poem:

She thinks her own sleeves only are wet
But another's also are rotting.

Second poem:

Dew-life soon to vanish away,
Hangs long suspended in forgetfulness of self
On the long-blooming chrysanthemum flower.

Third poem:

Sleepless the call of wild geese on the cloud-track
Yet the pain is from your own heart.

Fourth poem:

There may be another with thoughts like mine,
Who is gazing toward the sky of the morning moon.

Fifth poem:

Although not together
You too were gazing at the moon
Believing that I went this morning to your gate,
Alas!

O that gate hard to be opened!

So her writing had not been uselessly sent!

Towards the moon-hidden day she had another letter. After excusing himself for his late neglect he wrote:

I have an awkward thing to ask you. There is a lady with whom I have been secretly intimate. She is going away to a distant province and I want to send her a poem which will touch her heart deeply. Everything you write touches me, so please compose a poem for me.

She was unwilling conceitedly to carry out his wishes, but she thought it too prudish to refuse him, so she wrote with the words: "How can I satisfy you?"

Her poem:

In the tears of regret
Your image will linger long
Even after chilly Autumn has gone by.

It is painful for me to write a heartfelt letter in your place.

And on the margin she wrote:

Leaving you, where can she go?
For me no other life.

The Prince wrote back:

Very good poem is all that I can say. I cannot say that you have expressed my heart. Forsaking me she wanders away.

So let it be.
Let me think of you, the unexcelled one.
There is not another.

Thus I can live on.

It was the Tenth month and more than ten days had passed before the Prince came to her.

"The inner room is too dark and makes me restless. Let me sit here near the veranda." He said many heart-touching and tender words. She could not help being pleased. The moon was hidden and rain came pattering down; the scene was in harmony with their feeling. Her heart was disturbed with mingled emotions. The Prince perceived her feeling and thought: "Why is she so much slandered by others? She is always here alone sorrowing thus." He pitied her and startled the lady a little whose head was bowed in distress on her hand by reciting a poem:

It is not dripping rain nor morning dew
Yet here lying, strangely wet are the sleeves of the arm-pillow.

She was overwhelmed by feeling and could not speak, but he saw her tears glistening in the moonlight. He was touched and said: "Why do you not speak? Have my idle words displeased you?" She replied: "I do not know why, but I feel that my heart is anguished, though your words are in my ears. You will see," she went on lightly; "I shall never forget your poem on the sleeves of the arm-pillow."

Thus the pitiful sad night was passed, and the Prince saw that she had no other lover. He was sorry to go away from her in the early dawn, and immediately sent a message: "How are you to-day? Are the tears dry this morning?"

Her answer:

In the morning they were dry,
For only in a dream
Were the sleeves of the arm-pillow wet.

He read it and smiled at the word "arm-pillow" which she had said she should never forget.

His poem:

You say it was only in a dream
That the sleeves were wet with tears:
Yet I cannot dry them – the sleeves of the arm-pillow.

I have never experienced so sorrow-sweet an autumnal night. Was it the influence of the time?

After that he could not live without seeing her, and visited her oftener. As he saw her more intimately he saw that she was not a faithless woman. Her helpless situation touched his heart more and more, and he became deeply sympathetic with her. Once he said to her: "Even though you live on thus in solitude, I shall never forget you, but it would be better to come to my palace. All these slanderous rumours are due to your living alone. I for my part never met any men [here]; is it because I come from time to time? Yet others tell me very improper things about you which should not be heard; it made me unspeakably sad to turn away from your shut gate. Remembering that you are living in loneliness I sometimes have made a decision; yet being old-fashioned in my ways I hesitated to tell you of it because I anticipated the profound sadness with which you would hear these rumours; nevertheless, I cannot continue our relations in this way. I fear that the rumour might become true; then I should not be allowed to come, and you would become for me like the moon in the Heavenly way. If you really feel the loneliness you speak of, please come to me. There are many persons living there [in his palace], yet you will have no feeling of constraint. As I have been unhappy in my domestic relations, I do not linger in that desolate region [the house of his Princess]; but am always alone, performing religious services; I hope that my loneliness may be lessened by talking with you whose mind is in sympathy with mine."

Her feeling was opposed to such a thing; she had never told him about the late Prince. Yet there was no mountain retreat to which she could fly from World-troubles and her present condition seemed like a never-ending night. There had been many men who had wanted her; hence many strange reports were flying about. She could have confidence in no one but the Prince, so she was much tempted.

She thought: "He has his wife, yet she lives in a detached house, the nurse does all for him. If I show my affection and take pride in it, I shall be much blamed; my wish is that he should hide me from the world."

"Though to be visited by you is a rare occurrence, such a time soothes my heart; there is nothing else. So let anything happen, I will yield to your every wish. Elsewhere they are saying ugly things about us; if they see the fact accomplished, how much harder their words will be!"