Description
When the ghost of the great beauty and poet Ono no Komachi asks a wandering priest (right) to pray for her soul, she is held back by the ghost of a former suitor, Shii no Shosho. He had sacrificed his life in a vain effort to prove his love and cannot bear to have her leave him again.
Komachi: Would you still have me suffer
The tortures of hell?
Shosho: Even when we suffered them together
The pains were grievous,
But if you alone attain
The Way of the Buddha
You will add to the weight I bear
Yet another cloak of sorrow,
Piling grief on grief.
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