Poem from the Meager Gleanings (Shūi gusō)
Returned to lender
This work of art was on loan to the museum and has since been returned to its lender.Kōetsu rendered the thirty-one-syllable court poem (waka) by Fujiwara no Teika (1162–1241), one of Japan’s greatest poets, on a light blue paper decorated with miscanthus grasses. The poem, about the moon over the bay, reads:
Hisakata no
tsuki no hikari o
shirotae ni
shikitsu no ura no l
nami no akikaze
Rays of moonlight
glisten and spread out
like a white cloth over waves
apping at the Bay of Shikitsu
buffeted by autumn winds.
The elegant poem card is mounted as a hanging scroll with tsujigahana silks. Translated literally as “flowers (hana) at the crossroads (tsuji),” the term evokes images of delicate blossoms amid pathways. While the precise meaning of the word remains unclear, it is used today to refer to a textile technique: stitch-resist dyeing and ink painting on a lightweight, plain-weave ground, often embellished with gold-leaf imprinting and embroidery.
Hisakata no
tsuki no hikari o
shirotae ni
shikitsu no ura no l
nami no akikaze
Rays of moonlight
glisten and spread out
like a white cloth over waves
apping at the Bay of Shikitsu
buffeted by autumn winds.
The elegant poem card is mounted as a hanging scroll with tsujigahana silks. Translated literally as “flowers (hana) at the crossroads (tsuji),” the term evokes images of delicate blossoms amid pathways. While the precise meaning of the word remains unclear, it is used today to refer to a textile technique: stitch-resist dyeing and ink painting on a lightweight, plain-weave ground, often embellished with gold-leaf imprinting and embroidery.
Artwork Details
- 本阿弥光悦作 拾遺愚草 断簡
- Title: Poem from the Meager Gleanings (Shūi gusō)
- Calligrapher: Hon'ami Kōetsu (Japanese, 1558–1637)
- Period: Edo period (1615–1868)
- Date: ca. 1620s–1630s
- Culture: Japan
- Medium: Hanging scroll; ink on paper with mica, mounted with tsujigahana silk
- Dimensions: Image: 7 7/8 × 6 5/8 in. (20 × 16.8 cm)
Overall with mounting: 51 9/16 × 12 3/16 in. (131 × 31 cm) - Classification: Calligraphy
- Credit Line: Lent by John C. Weber Collection
- Curatorial Department: Asian Art