Compared with the longing I feel now, after we met and were united, what I felt before was as if I had not been thinking of you at all.
Mid-Heian period. Gon-Chūnagon Atsutada, the third son of Fujiwara no Tokihira, Minister of the Left, was a young nobleman celebrated as a master of the biwa. This poem is regarded as a "kinuginu no uta" — a morning-after poem sent to a lover the morning after they first became intimate — composed in the lingering glow of their tryst. In those days, the man sent the morning-after poem, and the woman waited in her room for the letter. Atsutada died young, at thirty-eight, and his poem lives on in the Hyakunin Isshu as one of its celebrated love poems.
"Compared with my heart now, after we have met and become one, my feelings of the past are as if I had felt nothing at all" — love once known for real is so deep that the longing that had burned so fiercely seems like "nothing." A poem that captures the perspective of love in a single verse.
Before and after being united, the very meaning of the word "love" has changed — we turned the heart of the original poem into an adaptation about "the way the world sounds has changed." The chirping of small birds and the sway of the first train of the morning, once mere noise before you knew love, all sound different the next morning. What changed was not the world but yourself. Even the structure — three chorus melodies gathering into a single song at the end — is a modern translation of "in the past I felt nothing at all."
逢ひ見ての（権中納言敦忠・百人一首43番）／ Garu JP
初めて過ごした君との朝
「送ってくよ」と 跳ね起きた君
「駅までいいよ」と 笑ってみせた
夜明けの道を ゆっくり歩く
発車のベルが 急かすホームで
言いたいことば 迷子のまま
「またね」ひとつが やっとの声で
おたがいまだ 続きがある目で
言えなかったことば 胸にあずけて
昨日まで知ってた 「好き」の意味が
今朝はもう 別の色してる
逢い見ての のちの心に
くらぶれば 恋を知る前の
わたしはなにも 想っていなかった
見えなかった 朝がここにある
小鳥のさえずり 祝福のメロディ
がらんとした 始発の車両
窓に映った にやけたわたし
手のひらにまだ 君の温度が
つないだかたちの まま残ってる
「またね」のつづき 送りたくて
何度も書いては 消してしまう
逢い見ての のちの心は
戻れない 戻りたくもない
知らないころの わたしのままじゃ
見えなかった 朝がここにある
揺れる車内は ときめきのメロディ
逢い見ての のちの心に くらぶれば
昔はものを 思わざりけり
千年前の 恋する人は
夜明けの部屋で 文を待ってた
「逢い見ての」と 書かれた恋を
胸に抱いて 朝を生きた
待つだけだった 朝の光を
いまのわたしは 歩いて帰る
逢い見ての のちの心は
昔もいまも 同じ熱のまま
文をよみあげる 姫君の声に
けさの鼻歌 そっとかさねて
時をこえて歌う 恋のメロディ
はしゃぎたいのに すこし怖いのは
これが本物だと 知ってるから
だけど今日は 疑わないで
この気持ちだけ 連れて帰る
逢い見ての のちの心で
「ただいま」を言う ひとりの部屋で
スキップみたいな 心拍のまま
君と見つけた 世界のメロディ
ぜんぶ集めて 歌にしたい
The first morning I ever spent with you
"I'll walk you out," you said, springing up
"Just to the station's fine," I laughed
Slowly walking down the dawnlit road
The departure bell hurried us on the platform
Words I wanted to say, still lost
"See you" — one word was all I could manage
And in your eyes and mine, more still to come
Words unspoken, I tucked into my chest
The meaning of "like" I knew until yesterday
This morning is already a different color
Compared to the heart I have now
Before I knew this love
I hadn't really felt a thing at all
There's a morning here I couldn't see before
The birds' song — a melody of blessing
An empty first-train car
My smirking face in the window
Your warmth is still on my palm
Holding the shape of our joined hands
The rest of "see you" — I want to send
Written and erased again and again
Compared to the heart I have now
There's no going back, and I don't want to
Not as the me who didn't know this
There's a morning here I couldn't see before
The swaying train — a melody of thrill
Compared to the heart I have after we met
The past feels like nothing to have thought of
A thousand years ago, one who loved
Waited in her dawn room for the letter
Holding a love written "Since we met"
She lived through morning with it in her chest
The morning light she could only wait for
I walk home in it now, on my own two feet
Compared to the heart I have now
Then and now, the same heat
Over the princess's voice reading the letter
I lay my morning humming, gently
Across time, we sing — the melody of love
I want to laugh out loud, but I'm a little scared
Because I know now this is the real thing
Just for today, don't doubt
Just this feeling, I'm bringing home
Compared to the heart I have now
Coming home to say "I'm back" in an empty room
Heartbeats skipping like a little dance
The melody of the world I found with you
I want to gather it all into a song