milliways_bar | (no subject)

"Hello Yamato-kun! I see you are studying diligently, if not exactly enthusiastically."

Seimei's face brightens when he gets a glimpse of the subject matter. "Ah! The ancient and revered waka poem!" he raises an eyebrow at Yamato. "I suspect that you do not appreciate the merits of this form of expression."

Well, Seimei cannot entirely blame him for that. In this modern day and age, it's not like Yamato can use a waka to impress his companions, bond with his friends, or charm someone he fancies. (Not to say he couldn't try, but it would be weird.)

"That's me, an ever diligent student," Yamato says without looking up. There might be an edge of sarcasm to his tone.

"I'm not a big fan of poetry at all, as a rule," he says, making a few more notes. "But since I have to trudge through this all, I may as well do it here, where there's a never-ending supply of coffee."

"A prudent approach," Seimei says. He scans through the poems. "Goodness. 'Sleeves turned to crimson.' If I had to read through a bunch of poems of similar quality I would be making the same face that you are now."

He so dislikes that image - it's melodramatic and actually pretty disgusting.

"It could be worse. Somewhere in this book, there's a poem by Emperor Sanjo about how he has no friends and that makes him sad," Yamato says gruffly.

"If in this troubled world of ours
I still must linger on,
My only friend shall be the moon,
Which on my sadness shone,
When other friends were gone,"

Seimei recites.

"Poor Emperor Sanjo! He was barely on the throne for three years. He suffered from ill health, his palace burnt down twice, and that despicable Fujiwara Michinaga forced him to abdicate. No wonder he felt so alone and full of melancholy."

"I'm sure the post-abdication life of vast wealth, leisure, and poetry-writing was a real burden on him," Yamato says dryly, making a few notes. "Not that I'm not sympathetic about the whole ill health thing, but I can think of worse things to happen than being forced off a throne."

"Indeed. There are far worse things. But he must have felt like he lived in a gilded cage," Seimei says. "And he did. The Emperor was supposed to be the most powerful person in the country - that is what everyone kept saying. But at that time the Emperor had less power over his own life and time than the lowliest peasant. He was a pawn, to be moved or taken off the board at the whim of his Regent, and he knew it."

By the time of Emperor Sanjo, the Fujiwaras were basically able to enthrone and dethrone Emperors at will.

"I'm weeping for him on the inside," Yamato says, shaking his head and turning a few pages.

He eventually hits a poem about a court lady refusing to sleep on a man's arm, and quickly starts scribbling down notes.

"I'm wondering whether this verse isn't just so she can avoid mentioning that that's a really weird thing to offer to do for someone."

"Oh, it was not about sleeping on his arm," Seimei says. "He was flirting with her, and rather boldly too. I suspect that she wanted to respond in kind, and perhaps strike up a romance with him. She envisioned them falling in love, getting married and having a long happy life together, all in the space of a few moments."

Seimei sighs wistfully.

"But she knew it would be foolish. The reality was that she would in all likelihood be nothing more than a fling to him. He would visit her a few times, steal her heart, and eventually leave her bereft. That often happened, after all."

"Probably would've been easier for her to just say that instead of bothering with the verse," Yamato mumbles. "Less artistic, sure, but a lot clearer and more direct for everyone involved."

"Well, the verse was a more elegant way to respond," Seimei says. "There is also a possible scenario in which the verse was a clever put-down rather than a lament. To give her his arm he would have had to stick it behind her blinds - or even come through her blinds to join her! So his offer was not chivalrous, but a rather rude come-on."

Seimei rolls his eyes. He knew a lot of men who would say just that sort of thing.

"And the poem was her way of telling him, 'I am not stupid, and do not even joke about ruining my reputation.'"

"I'm consistently amazed women in history didn't stab everyone they knew," Yamato murmurs, scribbling down a few notes.

"These were courtly women, not onna-bugeisha," Seimei says with a chuckle. "I do not think that the stabbing approach would have occurred to most of them."

Some of them probably considered it, though.

"The thing about waka is, while some of them are timeless works that stand on their own, most of them are not. They are particular feelings or messages at particular moments in time. The way they are presented these days tends to obscure that simple truth, which makes them harder to interpret."