The dew of a passing shower has not yet dried on the leaves of the black pines, and already the mist is rising — an autumn dusk.
Priest Jakuren (born Fujiwara no Sadanaga, c. 1139–1202) was the nephew and adopted son of Fujiwara no Shunzei and the elder brother-in-law of Fujiwara no Teika, a poet-monk of the late Heian and early Kamakura periods. He was chosen as one of the compilers of the Shin Kokin Wakashū but died before it was completed. This poem is one of the three famous poems that end with the phrase 'an autumn dusk' — the so-called 'Three Evenings' (the other two are Saigyō's 'Even a heart without feeling' and Teika's 'Looking out'). Shin Kokin Wakashū, Autumn II, 491. A shower has passed, dew still rests on the needles of the maki (an evergreen conifer), and white mist rises from the foot of the mountain — rain turning to dew, dew turning to mist, a few minutes in which water changes form, sealed inside thirty-one syllables: the summit of the Shin Kokin descriptive poem.
"A shower has passed; on the pine needles where the dew has not yet dried, white mist is rising — an autumn dusk." The poem never says 'lonely' or 'beautiful.' Without placing a single word of feeling, it simply lifts the gaze from the dew on the needle tips to the mist on the mountain, and lets the stillness of an autumn evening stand up on its own. A poet who had taken holy orders, in a hut on the mountain, was only watching the moment after rain. By not saying it, the poem reaches the deepest place — that silence is the true feeling of this poem.
What Kaoru and Kuroko tried to keep in this song was the same discipline as the original: not a single word of emotion. Over three rounds of poet's review we translated every 'sad,' 'gentle,' 'a gift,' 'it teaches us' into scenery and motion, and held to the rule 'never name the thing you most want to show' — instead of writing 'glitter,' a drop 'wears the evening sun.' The only act of will in the lyrics is 'let me set down a single breath here.' We made the rain-washed town a waltz in three because the rising mist swirls, and the washed town seemed to be slowly turning — the chorus's 'turning, turning, inside the mist' is that rotation, and time is measured not in numbers but in 'one blink.' The Bridge — 'Someone long ago, in a hut on the mountain, was watching this same mist / Now I am borrowing those eyes' — is the song's invention: someone today stops and borrows the gaze of Jakuren eight hundred years ago, recovered in the final chorus as 'the same blink as the one in the hut / seeing it now, with borrowed eyes.' We made it a duet for a man and a woman because this quiet belongs to no one alone; the whole town receives it at the same time.
村雨の（新古今集/寂蓮法師・百人一首87番）Garu JP
夕立の あとの 帰り道
濡れたベンチに 空が揺れる
傘をたたんで 息を吸えば
雨の匂いが 胸にひろがる
急いだ足が ふと止まって
洗われた街が 静かになる
村雨の 露もまだひぬ 槙の葉に
霧立ちのぼる 秋の夕暮れ
雫がひとつ 夕陽をまとい
ひとつ落ちて 街がゆっくり
まわる まわる 霧のなかで
息をひとつ 置いていこう
街のざわめき 雨だれの奥
濡れた並木を くぐって歩く
うつむいていた 一日の重さ
葉先の雫が ほどいて揺れる
乾くまでの 露のきらめき
まばたきひとつ くるりと消える
村雨の 露もまだひぬ 槙の葉に
霧立ちのぼる 秋の夕暮れ
湯気ゆらぐ路面 白いベール
街も山も 息を整え
まわる まわる 霧のなかで
この静けさを 覚えていよう
いにしえの人も 山の庵で
同じ霧を 見ていた
言葉少なに ただ佇んで
その目をいま 借りている
村雨の 露もまだひぬ 槙の葉に
霧立ちのぼる 秋の夕暮れ
村雨の 露もまだひぬ 槙の葉に
霧立ちのぼる 秋の夕暮れ
消えるまでの ひかりのすべて
庵の人と 同じまばたき
まわる まわる 霧のなかで
借りた目で いま見ている
霧立ちのぼる……
秋の夕暮れ
まわる まわる 霧のなかへ
Murasame no (Shin Kokin-shu / Priest Jakuren, Hyakunin Isshu No. 87) Garu JP
The way home after a passing shower
The sky trembles on a rain-wet bench
I fold my umbrella and breathe in
The scent of rain spreads through my chest
My hurried feet come to a stop
The washed-clean town falls silent
The dew of a passing shower not yet dried on the black pine leaves
Mist rises up — an autumn dusk
One drop wears the evening sun
One drop falls, and the town slows down
Turning, turning, inside the mist
Let me set down a single breath here
The noise of the town, deep behind the raindrops
I walk beneath the dripping trees
The weight of a day spent looking down
A drop on a leaf tip loosens it and sways
The glimmer of dew before it dries
One blink, and it twirls away
The dew of a passing shower not yet dried on the black pine leaves
Mist rises up — an autumn dusk
Steam wavers on the road, a white veil
Town and mountain catch their breath
Turning, turning, inside the mist
Let me remember this stillness
Someone long ago, in a hut on the mountain,
Was watching this same mist
Standing there, with few words
Now I am borrowing those eyes
The dew of a passing shower not yet dried on the black pine leaves
Mist rises up — an autumn dusk
The dew of a passing shower not yet dried on the black pine leaves
Mist rises up — an autumn dusk
All of this light, until it fades
The same blink as the one in the hut
Turning, turning, inside the mist
Seeing it now, with borrowed eyes
Mist rises up...
An autumn dusk
Turning, turning, into the mist