Poems about Plum Blossoms, from the “Sekido-bon Version of Collection of Poems Ancient and Modern”

Traditionally attributed to Fujiwara no Yukinari Japanese

Not on view

A thirty-one-syllable poem on early spring appears inscribed on blue-dyed paper in an elegant, flowing script—mostly kana. It is from the Collection of Poems Ancient and Modern (Kokin wakashū), the first imperially commissioned anthology of waka, compiled around 905 by the courtier-poet Ki no Tsurayuki. This page, remounted as a hanging scroll, was once bound into an edition known as the Sekido-bon, with pages dyed various colors. The poem reads:

くるとあくと　めかぬものを　むめの花
いつの人まに　うつろひむ「ら」む

At dusk and dawn,
I could not stop gazing
upon the plum blossoms—
so when was the moment
they started to fade?

Poems about Plum Blossoms, from the “Sekido-bon Version of Collection of Poems Ancient and Modern”, Traditionally attributed to Fujiwara no Yukinari (Japanese, 972–1027), Page from a bound booklet mounted as a hanging scroll; ink on dyed paper, Japan

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Poems about Plum Blossoms, from the “Sekido-bon Version of Collection of Poems Ancient and Modern”, Traditionally attributed to Fujiwara no Yukinari (Japanese, 972–1027), Page from a bound booklet mounted as a hanging scroll; ink on dyed paper, Japan
Poems about Plum Blossoms, from the “Sekido-bon Version of Collection of Poems Ancient and Modern”, Traditionally attributed to Fujiwara no Yukinari (Japanese, 972–1027), Page from a bound booklet mounted as a hanging scroll; ink on dyed paper, Japan

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