NAGAHIDE II and ICHIRAKUSAI NAGAMATSU (CHOSHO) may be mentioned as followers of Choki. The fact that we do not know of more disciples of so brilliant a designer is another one of the inexplicable things that surround him.
I walk the crowded Yedo streets, And everywhere one question greets My passing, as the strollers say-- "How goes the Master's work to-day? We saw him sketching hard last night At Ryogoku, where the bright Trails of the rockets lit the air. You should have seen the ladies there! All the most famous of the town In gorgeous robes walked up and down The long bridge-span, well-knowing he Was there to draw them gorgeously. I'm sure he'll give us something fine-- Dark splendid figures, lights ashine, A great procession of our best And costliest Oiran, with the West Burning behind them. When it's done, Pray, of the copies, save me one."
Yes, I am pupil to the great. How well he bears his famous state! With what superbness he fulfills The multitude's delighted wills, Giving them, at their eager call, Each play and feast and festival Drawn with a rich magnificence: And they come flocking with their pence To buy his sheets whose supple power Captures the plaudits of the hour-- Till even Utamaro's eyes Turn, kindled with swift jealousies.
Strange! that before this crowded shrine One voice is lacking, and that mine-- I, learner in his lordly house-- I, on whose cold, unwilling brows The lights of his strong glory burn, Blinding my heart that needs must yearn Far from the measure of his state-- I, liegeman to another fate. Would that some blindness came on me That I might cease one hour to see, For all his high, ambitious will, His is a peasant's nature still.... What utter madness that my thought Weighs him--I who am less than naught! Where he walks boldly, there I creep. Where his assured long brush-strokes sweep Unhesitant, there I falter, strain With agony--perhaps in vain-- For some more subtly curving line, Some musical poising of design That shall at last, at last express My frailer glimpse of loveliness. And yet, for all his facile art, I hug my impotence to my heart. For there are things his marching mind In steady labours day by day With all its sight shall never find, With all its craft can never say. There are lights along the dusky street That his bold eyes have never caught; There are tones more luminous, more sweet Than any that his hopes have sought. There are torturing lines that curve and fall Like dying echoes musical, Or twine and lave and bend and roll, In labyrinths to lure my soul. His ladies sumptuous and rare Move princess-like in proud design Of glowing loveliness: but where His bannered pomps and pageants shine, I feel a stiller, rarer peace, A cadence breathless, slender, lone. And where his facile brush-strokes cease Begins the realm that is my own.