Choka

Teka ( jap. 長 歌 cho: ka , “long song”) , also “nagauta” is a genre of Japanese poetry, opposed to a short five-line tank built on the principle of alternating lines of 5-7-5-7-7 syllables. The principle of constructing a poem is the same as in a tank, but its size is practically unlimited (up to 50 poems or more). The song consists of two seven-syllable lines.

A. E. Gluskin in the article "The poetry of the decline of antiquity and the early dawn of the Middle Ages" defines this genre as follows:

Of the 4516 songs of the Man'yoshyu , 57 sadokas , 265 nagauts and 4194 tanks can be distinguished.

Metrically, all these poetic genres are built on the alternation of a certain number of syllables. In theka, or nagauta, five- and seven-syllable verses alternate, forming twelve-syllable links, expressed in two lines and fixed at the end by an additional line of seven syllables. For a tek or nagaut, a later period is characterized by the presence of a hunk , or kaeshi-uta , - a peculiar refrain, or refrain, in the form of a tank adjacent to the Tekka - a five-pointed, conveying the main idea or main emotional interest of the “long song”; sometimes it is just a response to the content of the text, sometimes even as a response from another person. The latter, apparently, reflects the enumeration of the female and male choir in the ritual dances. Kaeshi-uta can be several and different in character, but more often it happens one or two.

Here is an example of a crown from “Man'yosyu” with a kaeshi-uta chorus added at the end:

17

Song composed by Princess Nukada during her departure to Omi Province

Holy sweet wine,
What do people bring to the gods ...
Mount Miwa!
Without taking your eyes off the top,
I will go admiring
Until the roads
Pile of brains piles,
See you still allow
Until they hide
From the eyes of you mountains Nara
In the marvelous green trees.
Oh, how often, Oh, how often
I will look back
To admire you!
And in these minutes,
Having no heart at all
Clouds can hide you
From my eyes forever?

18

Kaeshi-uta

Mount Miwa!
Do you hide now forever?
Oh, when would that sky
The clouds had a heart
Did they hide you from sight?

(translation. A. E. Gluskina ) ^[1]