"The imperial hunter"

Kimono-style coat with oversized bow at the neck. Crafted in off-white silk gazar. Kimono sleeves. Underdress in hand-finished cotton gauze.

THE IMPERIAL HUNTER

"Once, a man travelled to the province of Ise as an imperial huntsman. The mother of the High Priestess of Ise had advised her daughter to show him greater favour than usual: each morning, she bid him farewell as he left to hunt, and each evening she received him in her private quarters upon his return.

On the second night, the man proposed a secret meeting. The Priestess would have accepted gladly, but the number of people around her made it impossible without attracting attention. Still, his lodgings were close to hers, and so, when all had retired, she went to see him. He was awake, gazing out into the garden, when he saw her approaching in the moonlight. Overjoyed, he welcomed her into his chamber, and they remained together until half past two. When she left, they exchanged no vows, and the man, overwhelmed by sorrow, could not sleep.

The next morning, though burning with impatience, he had to wait to hear from her. Soon after dawn, this poem arrived:

Did you come to me—
or was it I who came to you?
How can I tell?
Was it real, or just a dream?
Was I asleep, or awake?

Weeping bitterly, he sent back:

A heavy darkness
floods my heart with restless doubts.
Was it real, or just a dream?
Let the truth
be known tonight.

He then set out to hunt. As he rode across the plain, his thoughts returned to the night to come, hoping they might meet once more. But the provincial governor had caught wind of the affair and held a grand banquet in the hunter’s honour that lasted the whole night. The man never saw her again, for at dawn he was due to leave for the province of Owari. Just before daybreak, the Priestess sent him a parting cup of sake, along with a verse:

Light rain barely wets the traveller’s sleeves...

But the final lines were missing. Taking a coal from a torch, he wrote:

...who longs to sink into them
but finds no still water."