Page:Anthology of Japanese Literature.pdf/286

282 … my garments wet and dripping as are the rocks which stand offshore, forever in the ebbing and flowing of the tide … coursing the beaches, crossing the sea even to the shores of the farther islands … my flesh burnt as though I had approached too near the salt-kilns of Chika….

Still and always I pursued my evil ways, forgetful of the days of retribution, heedless of all regret.


 * (The Hunter touches his hands together in the conventional gesture which introduces a principal dance, bows his head and rises, grasping his stick. He begins gradually to keep rhythm with the music, but without yet moving from place.)

Now the ways of murdering birds are many, but this scheme by which these pitiful ones are taken….

… can there be one more heartless than this?


 * (The Hunter now begins moving slowly about the stage, searching, keeping time with the music.)

You stupid, foolish bird! If only you had built your nest with feathers, high in the treetops of the forests, forests dense as that which lies about the Peak of Tsukuba … if only you had woven floating cradles upon the waves…. But no! here upon the beaches, as broad and sandy as those upon which wild geese settle for a moment’s rest in their northward flight, you raise your young. And here, O bird of sorrow, you think to hide them. But then I, calling “Utō,” come … they answer “Yasukata” … and the nestlings are taken. It is as simple as this!


 * (Still searching, the Hunter has started toward the Bridge, but when the Chorus gives the cry of “Utō” he pauses at the Name-Saying Seat and listens. And at the cry “Yasukata” he whirls back toward the stage, as though hearing the birds in the nest. He stamps his foot once and in the midst of a profound silence gives the bird call.)

Utō!