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Poem by Fujiwara no Norinaga on Paper Decorated with Butterflies

Hon'ami Kōetsu Japanese

early 17th century

Not on view

Aki no uchi wa
aware shiraseshi
kaze no ne no
hageshisa sōru
fuyu wa ki ni keri

While autumn lingers,
sadness in the sound
of the howling winds
signals that winter
is already on its way.

—Trans. John T. Carpenter

Silver-micaed butterflies are perched on stems of grass. They face to the right—the opposite of the movement of the calligrapher’s brush, and of the reader’s eye. Impressed on age-mellowed pale gray paper, the bright, ethereal butterfly motifs would normally be reserved for springtime. Pretty as they are, the image clashes with a poem that begins with the Chinese character for autumn, aki (秋), written with the two parts of the character reversed as a calligraphic flourish. The poem, by the courtier-poet Fujiwara no Norinaga (1109–1180), is from the imperially commissioned Collection of Japanese Poems of a Thousand Years (Senzai wakashū). The work is a section from a longer handscroll; the calligrapher’s black square seal, reading “Kōetsu,” would have marked the end of the scroll.