this night in dreams
I follow the wind
five thousand miles
then ten
then twenty
searching for you
my love
always searching
for you
to carry you away
on my painted boat
away my love
away
longing for a loved one
from Lady Midnight Songs of the Four Seasons: Autumn 6
You left in early spring, and I long
to have you back by autumn’s end.
How I hate this river flowing east:
all year, never a care for the west.
translated by David Hinton
poem by Prince Naga from The Man’yoshü
If autumn were here
these would be mountains
as we see them now,
where the deer cries
in longing for his wife–
on these high fields.
translated by Ian Hideo Levy
Leonard Durso 