A Hundred Verses from Old Japan · 72 of 101

71. The First Adviser of State Tsune-nobu: Dai-Nagon Tsune-nobu

71

The First Adviser of State Tsune-nobu

Dai-nagon Tsune-nobu

Yūsareba Kado-da no inaba Otozurete Ashi no maroya ni Aki kaze zo fuku.

THIS autumn night the wind blows shrill, And would that I could catch Its message, as it whistles through The rushes in the thatch And leaves of my rice-patch.

Tsune-nobu, a member of the Minamoto family, was famous as a man of letters in the eleventh century, and died in the year 1096.