Fic: The Hands' Correspondance (UgetsuG)
Title: The Hands' Correspondance
Author: Ryuutchi
Fandom: Katekyo Hitman Reborn
Rating: PG-13 (for obscure sexual references)
Warnings: Obscure sexual references, over the top loveyness. Footnotes for clarity at the end.
Word count: ~850
Summary: Ugetsu writes a love letter. G tries not to be impressed.
Notes: Written for the khrfest prompt: "G/Ugetsu - long distance; Ugetsu writes G love letters while they're apart"
When I think of you,
fireflies in the marsh rise
like the soul’s jewels,
lost to eternal longing,
abounding my body
-Izumi Shikibu (970-1030)
Under the ume tree1, the evening full of stars like pinpricks through the night sky, is the ideal time to write letters. Indeed, one will often sit and think by the stream, with a lantern by one's side and a brush in one's hand. Sometimes words come easily and one's heart will open like a blossom.
To his glorious right hand
I was sitting beneath the pine tree2, my companion in solitude, listening to the distant storm. How much lower the clouds hang in Italy! I miss being able to reach up and run my fingers through them like silk. So my heart aches with missing you and I write only to ask if you are well.
If you can say yes, then my heart brightens for it is truly a lucky man whose fortunes shine so brightly as ours. As they say: Encountering the right one at the wrong time, life is sad; Encountering the wrong one at the right time, life is a sigh; Encountering the right one at the right time, life is happiness3. I say this not to be forward, and I hope you don't think me so, but when the passing wind whispers your name, I feel I have been poisoned by my love. Only my lord's commands and the knowledge that you are at his right hand keep my heart beating steadily.
Perhaps you would prefer news of the capital over the sighing of your humble scholar. I know how much you enjoyed its pleasures when you visited and it has no grown less lovely. My flowers continue to bloom as they always have, and I have been practicing ikebana. So I do not think you or our lord will be displeased with our arrangements. Our clients tell me they have found flowers to suit any taste. I worry that too many of this city's blossoms have been crushed in the plucking and hope you will support my attempts to transplant the most fragrant into our gardens.
Meanwhile, the capital police continue to be useless. They should learn from our friend Alaude and be aloof from the city but a part of it. Otherwise, they are open to corruption. You will be saddened to learn that both criminals and vigilantes have moved into the place left deserted by the police force's great neglect of their duties. In spite of these changes, however, the capital remains as lovely as ever. I fear that my experience of the city has become dulled through your absence.
A pause. If the place is well-chosen, then fireflies will court one another and the light in the lantern. Shadows lay long on the river and even fish don't break its placid surface. Like the story, which said the fish spoke to water and said, “you can not see my tears, because I am in the water.” And water said, “I can feel your tears, because you are in me,”4 all elements enjoin with one another to create a wistful feeling. It will be silent save the rustling of brush on paper.
Forgive me, I don't wish to trouble you with unnecessary things, but the moon broke free of her skirt of clouds just now, and the shadows she makes on the botan5 which grow close at hand remind me of the irezumi6 that dapples your skin. Do you remember those times when you let me brush your petals against my skin? I wait anxiously for the time when I can once again make you open for me as the peony does for the dew.
There will be no dew tonight, though. The pressure bears down on me, and I can taste the coming storm. It makes me feel nostalgic. Do you recall how we so enjoyed each other's company during the season of bad weather? We made tea, and listened to the pounding force that was the storm and rain intertwined. Thinking about such things makes my chest ache from wanting, I long to drink tea by your side once more.
But you never could differentiate between the gyokuro and the sencha7, so perhaps you would prefer sake instead. So I will ready a bottle, for our time apart may be long but, as with the sake, our care for one another will be all the more delicate and beautiful for our time spent in waiting for the moment when we may drain our cups.
I will surely be scolded by our master if I take too much of your time with my frivolous wanderings, therefore I will let my seal on this letter be my mouth on your skin.
Ever the humble, meandering left,
Asari Ugetsu
Lines like a map are worn into paper as pale as the skin of the man holding it so that one might almost mistake where the paper ends and the man begins.
Ugetsu,
I lo I mis Giotto sends his regards.
G.
Is it forever
That he hopes our love will last?
He did not answer.
And now my daylight thoughts
Are as tangled as my black hair.
-Taiken Moin no Horikawa (12th century)
Footnotes:
1 Ume blossoms, or plum blossoms, are a symbol of coming springtime. They're a bit romantic, as you might guess.
2 Ugetsu is not being literal-"pining" and "pine" are the same pun in Japanese as they are in English.
3, 4 Both of these quotes came from a page of Chinese SMS love notes. I thought they sounded ridiculously sweet.
5 Botan, or peonies, are symbols of feminine beauty and female genitalia. Yes, Ugetsu went there.
6 Irezumi just means tattoos, but by putting emphasis on it, Ugetsu is indicating that its something lower class and criminal.
7 Gyokuro is tea that is grown in the shade, and is one of the most expensive types of Japanese tea. Sencha is standard Japanese steamed green tea.
Author: Ryuutchi
Fandom: Katekyo Hitman Reborn
Rating: PG-13 (for obscure sexual references)
Warnings: Obscure sexual references, over the top loveyness. Footnotes for clarity at the end.
Word count: ~850
Summary: Ugetsu writes a love letter. G tries not to be impressed.
Notes: Written for the khrfest prompt: "G/Ugetsu - long distance; Ugetsu writes G love letters while they're apart"
When I think of you,
fireflies in the marsh rise
like the soul’s jewels,
lost to eternal longing,
abounding my body
-Izumi Shikibu (970-1030)
Under the ume tree1, the evening full of stars like pinpricks through the night sky, is the ideal time to write letters. Indeed, one will often sit and think by the stream, with a lantern by one's side and a brush in one's hand. Sometimes words come easily and one's heart will open like a blossom.
To his glorious right hand
I was sitting beneath the pine tree2, my companion in solitude, listening to the distant storm. How much lower the clouds hang in Italy! I miss being able to reach up and run my fingers through them like silk. So my heart aches with missing you and I write only to ask if you are well.
If you can say yes, then my heart brightens for it is truly a lucky man whose fortunes shine so brightly as ours. As they say: Encountering the right one at the wrong time, life is sad; Encountering the wrong one at the right time, life is a sigh; Encountering the right one at the right time, life is happiness3. I say this not to be forward, and I hope you don't think me so, but when the passing wind whispers your name, I feel I have been poisoned by my love. Only my lord's commands and the knowledge that you are at his right hand keep my heart beating steadily.
Perhaps you would prefer news of the capital over the sighing of your humble scholar. I know how much you enjoyed its pleasures when you visited and it has no grown less lovely. My flowers continue to bloom as they always have, and I have been practicing ikebana. So I do not think you or our lord will be displeased with our arrangements. Our clients tell me they have found flowers to suit any taste. I worry that too many of this city's blossoms have been crushed in the plucking and hope you will support my attempts to transplant the most fragrant into our gardens.
Meanwhile, the capital police continue to be useless. They should learn from our friend Alaude and be aloof from the city but a part of it. Otherwise, they are open to corruption. You will be saddened to learn that both criminals and vigilantes have moved into the place left deserted by the police force's great neglect of their duties. In spite of these changes, however, the capital remains as lovely as ever. I fear that my experience of the city has become dulled through your absence.
A pause. If the place is well-chosen, then fireflies will court one another and the light in the lantern. Shadows lay long on the river and even fish don't break its placid surface. Like the story, which said the fish spoke to water and said, “you can not see my tears, because I am in the water.” And water said, “I can feel your tears, because you are in me,”4 all elements enjoin with one another to create a wistful feeling. It will be silent save the rustling of brush on paper.
Forgive me, I don't wish to trouble you with unnecessary things, but the moon broke free of her skirt of clouds just now, and the shadows she makes on the botan5 which grow close at hand remind me of the irezumi6 that dapples your skin. Do you remember those times when you let me brush your petals against my skin? I wait anxiously for the time when I can once again make you open for me as the peony does for the dew.
There will be no dew tonight, though. The pressure bears down on me, and I can taste the coming storm. It makes me feel nostalgic. Do you recall how we so enjoyed each other's company during the season of bad weather? We made tea, and listened to the pounding force that was the storm and rain intertwined. Thinking about such things makes my chest ache from wanting, I long to drink tea by your side once more.
But you never could differentiate between the gyokuro and the sencha7, so perhaps you would prefer sake instead. So I will ready a bottle, for our time apart may be long but, as with the sake, our care for one another will be all the more delicate and beautiful for our time spent in waiting for the moment when we may drain our cups.
I will surely be scolded by our master if I take too much of your time with my frivolous wanderings, therefore I will let my seal on this letter be my mouth on your skin.
Ever the humble, meandering left,
Asari Ugetsu
Lines like a map are worn into paper as pale as the skin of the man holding it so that one might almost mistake where the paper ends and the man begins.
Ugetsu,
I lo I mis Giotto sends his regards.
G.
Is it forever
That he hopes our love will last?
He did not answer.
And now my daylight thoughts
Are as tangled as my black hair.
-Taiken Moin no Horikawa (12th century)
Footnotes:
1 Ume blossoms, or plum blossoms, are a symbol of coming springtime. They're a bit romantic, as you might guess.
2 Ugetsu is not being literal-"pining" and "pine" are the same pun in Japanese as they are in English.
3, 4 Both of these quotes came from a page of Chinese SMS love notes. I thought they sounded ridiculously sweet.
5 Botan, or peonies, are symbols of feminine beauty and female genitalia. Yes, Ugetsu went there.
6 Irezumi just means tattoos, but by putting emphasis on it, Ugetsu is indicating that its something lower class and criminal.
7 Gyokuro is tea that is grown in the shade, and is one of the most expensive types of Japanese tea. Sencha is standard Japanese steamed green tea.