Lady Ise

Is it your command
That we must pass through this life
Not meeting, even
For a space short as the nodes
Of the reeds of Naniwa?

Naniwa gata
Mijikaki ashi no
Fushi no ma mo
Awade kono yo wo
Sugushite yo to ya


- translated by Kenneth Rexroth
from One Hundred Poems from the Japanese