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Yosano Akiko poem help

Talie

後輩
20 Mar 2014
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Hello!

Could you please help me to find this Yosano Akiko poem in Japanese?

Not speaking of the way,
Not thinking of what comes after,
Not questioning name or fame,
Here, loving love,
You and I look at each other.

The first time I saw it in Russian translation, but I'm almost sure this is the same one in English

(there are slight differences - in Russian there was nothing about "fame", and the ending resembled:
We do not pronounce vows "till death does us apart"
We just love,
The both of us.
but I think it's more to do with preserving the poem's mood & tanka style then translating the exact words)

I've been looking for the Japanese original everywhere, no luck at all.

Please, if anyone recognises it or has seen an English-Japanese Yosano Akiko poems anthology online (French-Japanese would do too), please send me a link or type a transcription here!

My gratitude would be sans limites....
Thank you,
Talie
 
道を云はず後を思はず名を問はずここに恋ひ恋ふ君と我と見る
Michi wo iwazu nochi wo omowazu na wo towazu koko ni koi kou kimi to ware to miru
(from her first anthology of tanka poems みだれ髪[Midaregami] Disheveled Hair, Chapter 春思[Shunshi] Thoughts in Spring)

"Michi" here means not just "way", but more likely "the way people should live in" i.e. ethic, morals, ideology, religion or like that, as in her famous poem やは肌のあつき血汐にふれも見でさびしからずや道を説く君[Yawahada no atsuki chishio ni fure mo mide sabishikarazu ya michi wo toku kimi].
 
Thank you so much!

Oh yes, I had a feeling it was from this anthology - I even found it online, but in pure Japanese unfortunately, no transcription whatsoever...
I'm sorry, but if I translate you here the Russian version, could you please tell me if it resembles any other Akiko poems, if its not too much of a bother?

I'm asking because I've found another Russian version and comparing it to the English and Spanish ones I saw previously, the 3 are absolutely identical. So I'm really starting to worry that my poem is not just a more poetic translation, but smth else with similar motives.

the Eng/Sp/another Rus version:
I'm not talking about the way,
I'm not thinking about the future,
I don't know my name,
But here I love, I do.
You look at me, I look at you.

and the poetic Rus one:
Together or each his way,
And what are we called, or what [comes] next
We didn't ask about anything..
And we don't swear till the deathbed
We love, the both of us just love.

You see, the notions of "I" vs "we, together"; "asking" and "knowing"; "deathbed"; "we love" vs "we look at each other" - there are quite a lot of differences, even language adaptation taken into consideration, so I waver...

And there's no Japanese-Eng anthology of her poems somewhere on the inet?

Your help is wonderful, thank you very much again!
 
I've checked almost all of her poems (26 anthologies including the ones with other poets), but there's no poem that contains the word "deathbed", so I suppose it would be another translation version of the same poem. If really so, I don't think it's a good translation, or rather, there are many misinterpretations there. For instance, "na wo towazu" can seemingly mean "what are we called" especially if the translatior merely knows modern Japanese, but actually this clause means "I don't care about fame/honor (= even if bad rumors spread about us, I don't care)". She was in love with a married man; her teacher of poem and later hasband Tekkan at that time, therefore she mentioned about morals, what comes after (to them) or fame. That's the background of this poem.

There seems to be books of the English translation, but I don't know about the ones on the net.
 
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