The weir the wind has built across the mountain stream — it turns out to be autumn leaves, gathered where they could flow no further.
Harumichi no Tsuraki (d. 920) was a poet of the early Heian period. He became a student of letters at the court academy in 910 and was later appointed governor of Iki, but died before he could take up the post. Only five of his poems survive in the imperial anthologies, and most of his life is unknown. This poem is Kokin Wakashū, Autumn II, 303. Its headnote says it was composed 'on the Shiga mountain crossing' — the path from Shirakawa in the capital over the southern foot of Mount Hiei to Shiga temple (Sūfuku-ji) in Ōmi, a road that nobles of the day walked for pilgrimage and pleasure. Somewhere along it he made a poem out of one small thing he saw. His name and his life have almost vanished, but a single moment at a mountain stream has lasted a thousand years.
There is a weir across the mountain stream. Who built it? The wind. He comes closer, and it is not a weir at all: it is autumn leaves, piled up because they could not flow on. This is a poem about a mistake. He took it for a weir; he took it for the wind's work; he saw it was leaves. Three steps of noticing are laid out in order inside thirty-one syllables, and the answer — 'autumn leaves' — is held back until the very last word. The poet writes neither surprise nor delight. He leaves only 'narikeri', the breath of the moment of understanding. Deep in the mountains, with no one about, the wind had been doing a human's job — building a weir. The poem hands us that small absurdity and that quiet, without a word of comment.
What drew us most to this poem is that it never says what the thing is until the end. He thought it was a weir; he thought the wind had built it; and the last word tells us it was leaves. The order of the poem is the order of a walker's eyes. But 'shigarami' is a word that no longer brings a picture to mind: stakes driven into a stream, branches woven between them, water held back. We wanted listeners to see one before the poem needs it, so the song begins in the season when the paddies turn into mirrors of water, at a small stream with a real weir. The people there call it shigarami; as if it were the rest of that word, the old poem rises in the sound of the water. Then, in the season when the mountains begin to burn, on a path with nothing but birdsong, footsteps and the murmur of the stream, a low fence seems to hang far off between the trees. The closer he comes, the stakes disappear, and there is a row of red leaves on the quiet stream — the poet's mistake, traced again in the same order. The lyrics never use the word 'autumn leaves'; they say only 'red leaves', and the true name is spoken by the poem alone. In modern Japanese, shigarami also means the ties that bind people. We did not want to lecture about that. The song only says: when the wind changes direction, the shigarami will loosen and flow away, and until then the stream is in no hurry. It ends in the valley, where the real weir has been opened and the water runs straight on toward winter. A poet who left almost nothing but his name stopped for a moment at a mountain stream; we set that moment down in one day of someone walking in the hills.
山川に（古今集/春道列樹・百人一首32番）Garu JP
田んぼが 水の 鏡に なるころ
畦に 沿って 細い 川
杭を 並べて 枝を 編んだ
低い 柵が 水を 堰き止めて
田んぼへ 分けた その 残りが
音を 立てて 柵を 越えていく
土地の 人は しがらみと 呼んだ
その 名の 続きの ように
あの 歌が 水の 音に 浮かぶ
山川に 風のかけたる しがらみは
流れもあへぬ 紅葉なりけり
風が 架けた しがらみを
見た 人が いる
杭も 縄も ないのに
水を 止めた しがらみを
山が 燃えはじめる ころ
鳥の 声と 足音と
沢の せせらぎ だけの 道
木立の 先の 遠い 流れに
低い 柵が 架かって 見える
こんな 山の 上にも しがらみが
近づく ほどに 杭は 消えて
静かな 流れに 赤い 葉の 列
あの 歌が 沢の 上に 重なる
山川に 風のかけたる しがらみは
流れもあへぬ 紅葉なりけり
風が 架けた しがらみが
いま 足元に ある
杭も 縄も ないのに
葉だけが 水を 止めている
風が 向きを 変える ころ
しがらみは ほどけて 流れていく
溜まった 水も 一度に 下る
それまで 沢は 急がない
山川に 風のかけたる しがらみは
流れもあへぬ 紅葉なりけり
風が 架けた しがらみを
歌の 人と 見ている
杭も 縄も ないのに
水を 止めた 赤い しがらみ
紅葉なりけり……
麓の しがらみは 開いていた
水は まっすぐ 冬へ 流れる
Yamagawa ni (Kokin-shu / Harumichi no Tsuraki, Hyakunin Isshu No. 32) Garu JP
When the paddies turn into mirrors of water
a thin stream runs along the ridge
Stakes in a row, branches woven between —
a low fence holds the water back
What is left after the fields take their share
climbs over the fence with a sound
The people here call it shigarami
As if it were the rest of that word,
that old poem rises in the sound of the water
In the mountain stream, the weir the wind has built
is autumn leaves that cannot flow on
A weir the wind had built —
someone once stood and saw it
With no stakes and no rope,
a weir that held the water back
When the mountains begin to burn
birdsong, footsteps,
and the murmur of the stream — nothing else on this path
Far off, on a distant current between the trees,
a low fence seems to hang
A shigarami, even this high in the mountains
The closer I come, the stakes disappear —
a row of red leaves on the quiet stream
That old poem settles over the water
In the mountain stream, the weir the wind has built
is autumn leaves that cannot flow on
A weir the wind has built
is here, at my feet
With no stakes and no rope,
leaves alone are holding the water back
When the wind changes direction
the shigarami will loosen and flow away
The water it held will run down all at once
Until then, the stream is in no hurry
In the mountain stream, the weir the wind has built
is autumn leaves that cannot flow on
A weir the wind had built —
I see it with the poet
With no stakes and no rope,
a red weir that held the water back
...autumn leaves that cannot flow on
Down in the valley, the shigarami stood open
The water runs straight on toward winter