Quotes from Izumi Shikibu

Even when a river of tears courses through this body, the flame of love cannot be quenched.

In this world love has no color yet how deeply my body is stained by yours.

In love longing I listen to the monk's bell. I will never forget you even for an interval short as those between the bell notes.

In this world love has no color yet how deeply my body is stained by yours.

Even when a river of tears courses through this body, the flame of love cannot be quenched.

Even if I now saw you only once, I would long for you through worlds, worlds.

Watching the moon at dawn, solitary, mid-sky, I knew myself completely, no part left out.

The one close to me now, even my own body- these too will soon become clouds, floating in different directions.

Although the wind blows terribly here, the moonlight also leaks between the roof planks of this ruined house.

Things I Want Decided Which shouldn't exist in this world, the one who forgets or the one who is forgotten? Which is better, to love one who has died or not to see each other when you're alive? Which is better, the distant lover you long for or the one you see daily without desire? Which is the least unreliable among fickle things — the swift rapids, a flowing river, or this human world?

Nothing in the world is usual today. This is the first morning.

For a moment he became smoke. How intimate, now, the cloudy sky.

Rather than recall in these flowers the fragrance of the past, I would like to hear this nightingale's voice, to know if his song is as sweet.

When the netted fence of spiderwebs that darkens my ruined house can hold the wind in its strands- that's when these troubled thoughts will blow away. . . .

The way I must enter leads through darkness to darkness- O moon above the mountain's rim, please shine a little further on my path,

Although the cricket's song has no words, still, it sounds like sorrow.

Perhaps, if I make a friend of the mountain cuckoo in this world, he will talk to me when we cross the mountain of death

Oi elämäni, toivoton sammumaton. Miten kadehdin tuulen tuivertamia soihtuja yössä.

More fragrant because of the one who saw and picked them, these flowers, precious, transient--

Lakkaako kerran olemassaoloni, vai muistanenko viime tapaamisemme maailman tuolle puolen?