Just as the Mina River, falling from the peak of Mount Tsukuba, gradually becomes a deep pool, so my love has gathered and gathered until it too has become a deep pool.
Retired Emperor Yōzei was the fifty-seventh emperor. He ascended the throne at nine and was forced to abdicate at seventeen by the regent, Fujiwara no Mototsune (officially for misconduct, in reality a power struggle of regency politics). He then lived on as a retired emperor for more than sixty years, into his eighties, devoting himself to poetry. This poem was sent as a proposal to Princess Suishi, daughter of Emperor Kōkō, and the two were in fact united: one of the rare "loves fulfilled" among the love poems of the Hyakunin Isshu. Mount Tsukuba has twin peaks, the Male Peak and the Female Peak, and since ancient times it was a sacred site of love, where utagaki gatherings were held and men and women met to exchange poems.
A feeling that at first was like a single drop of water trickling from the summit has, before he knew it, grown as deep as a pool. "Koi zo tsumorite": love is something that piles up. For a retired emperor whose throne had been taken from him and most of whose life had been decided by others, this love was one of the few things that were truly his own will. The straightforwardness of it, with no elaborate technique, everything said through a single metaphor, is where his sincerity shows.
"Love has piled up and become a deep pool": we took the original poem's sense that love is something that accumulates and made it the very structure of the song. Just as water falling from two peaks becomes a single river, this is a duet in which a man's and a woman's voices, singing the same beginning from separate viewpoints, merge in the chorus. The closing line, "the name of this pool is you," changes at the very end to "is the two of us," and with that single-word change alone we depicted an unrequited love fulfilled.
筑波嶺の（後撰集/陽成院・百人一首13番）Garu JP
はじまりは きっと些細なこと
「おはよう」ひとつで 晴れる朝
それだけのこと だったのに
気づけば今日も 君を探してる
はじまりは きっと偶然のこと
帰り道 ふぞろいの歩幅
それだけのこと だったのに
となりの横顔 見上げてる
一滴ずつ 落ちてくる
音もなく 積もってく
この想いに 名前をつけるなら
筑波嶺の 峰より落つる みなの川
恋ぞつもりて 淵となりぬる
ひとしずくの「好き」が積もって
もう戻れない 深さになった
この淵の名前は 君だ
たわいない話の 帰り道
まだ帰りたくない って思った
何気ない日々の ひとつずつが
水かさを 増やしていく
浅い川なら 渡れたのに
もう膝まで 胸まで
筑波嶺の 峰より落つる みなの川
恋ぞつもりて 淵となりぬる
流れの速さじゃ なくて
深さで測るものが あるんだ
この淵の底まで 君と行く
千年前 玉座を追われた人も
この想いだけは 手放さなかった
沈むことを 恋と呼ぶなら
喜んで 沈もう
筑波嶺の 峰より落つる みなの川
恋ぞつもりて 淵となりぬる
筑波嶺の 峰より落つる みなの川
恋ぞつもりて 淵となりぬる
ひとしずくの日々が積もって
ふたりの淵は 深く静かだ
千年経っても 涸れないように
この淵の名前は 「ふたり」だ
恋ぞつもりて……
淵となりぬる
It began, I'm sure, with something small
A single "good morning" brightening the day
That was all it was, and yet
Before I know it, I'm looking for you again today
It began, I'm sure, by pure chance
Walking home, our steps out of sync
That was all it was, and yet
I find myself looking up at your face beside me
Drop by drop, it keeps falling
Without a sound, it keeps piling up
If I were to give this feeling a name
From the peaks of Mount Tsukuba falls the Mina River
my love has gathered, and become a deep pool
Each single drop of "I like you" piled up
until it became a depth I can't return from
The name of this pool is you
Walking home, chatting about nothing
I thought: I don't want to go home yet
Each ordinary day, one by one
keeps raising the water higher
If it were a shallow stream, I could have crossed
But now it's up to my knees, my chest
From the peaks of Mount Tsukuba falls the Mina River
my love has gathered, and become a deep pool
It's not about how fast it flows
Some things are measured by depth alone
To the bottom of this pool, I'll go with you
A thousand years ago, a man driven from his throne
never let go of this one feeling
If sinking is what they call love
then gladly, let us sink
From the peaks of Mount Tsukuba falls the Mina River
my love has gathered, and become a deep pool
From the peaks of Mount Tsukuba falls the Mina River
my love has gathered, and become a deep pool
Each single drop of our days piled up
and our pool is deep and still
May it never run dry, even in a thousand years
The name of this pool is "the two of us"
My love has gathered...
and become a deep pool
Tsukubane no (Gosen Wakashu / Hyakunin Isshu No.13) Garu JP