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A Hundred Verses from Old Japan (The Hyakunin-isshu), tr. by William N. Porter, [1909], at sacred-texts.com
HOW desolate my former life,
Those dismal years, ere yet
I chanced to see thee face to face
’Twere better to forget
Those days before we met.
Yatsu-tada was a member of the great Fujiwara family, and is said to have died in the year 943,
It is interesting to note in these illustrations, as in nearly all old Japanese pictures, that the artist either takes off the roof of the house or removes part of the wall when he wishes you to see what is going on indoors.
