Recent rain seemed to have scattered Tokyo's cherry blossoms, but this year's cherries are stubborn—still blooming proudly despite rain, and hanami should suffice this weekend. In the Imperial Palace East Gardens just south of Palaceside Building in Takebashi, Tokyo, cherries have not scattered much either, delighting visitors. Enjoying blossoms this late is rare.
The East Gardens of the Imperial Palace bloom with many flowers now, not only cherry. Beside Shiratori Moat, yamabuki (Japanese kerria) wears vivid yellow flowers, standing out sharply.
Rain, Edo Castle (Imperial Palace), yamabuki—naturally one recalls Ota Dokan's yamabuki legend.
《Ota Dokan, out hawking, took shelter in a shabby house in a sudden shower. When he asked to borrow a rain cape, a girl silently offered a single yamabuki blossom. Angry—"I wanted a cape, not a flower"—he left in the rain.
That night, telling retainers, one said, "In the Gosho shui anthology: 'Seven layers, eight layers of blossoms bloom, yet of yamabuki mi (fruit) no (cape) not one—how sad.' The girl likened their poverty—no cape at all—to yamabuki."
Startled, Dokan ashamed of his ignorance, from that day devoted himself to poetry》—so the tale goes. The girl's double cherry yamabuki bears no fruit, matching "cape" with yamabuki flowers—clever. Seasonally it fits now; where the girl lived is disputed—Ogose, Saitama; Takada, Toshima; Machiya, Arakawa; Mutsuura, Yokohama—each claims "Village of Yamabuki."
Either way, East Gardens yamabuki can be enjoyed a while longer, but the gardens close Friday and Monday. If only they were open every day...