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- Yamato Monogatari
Mi o ushi to omou kokoro no korineba ya hito o aware to omoisomuramu
Is it that this heart of mine, which finds itself hard to bear, will not learn? I am beginning, once again, to hold someone dear.
Futari koshi michi to mo mienu nami no ue o omoikakede mo kaesu meru kana
Over these waters, where no trace shows of the road the two of us came by, I am being sent back — as the waves come and go back.
Arihatenu inochi matsu ma no hodo bakari uki koto shigeku nagekazu mogana
For the little while I wait out this life, which will not last to the end, I would not have grief so thick upon me, nor so much sighing.
Kakaru ka no aki mo kawarazu nioi seba haru koishi chō nagame semashi ya
If a scent like this kept its fragrance unchanged into autumn, would I sit gazing out and saying that I long for spring?
Omoedomo kai nakarubemi shinoureba tsurenaki tomo ya hito no miruramu
Since caring for anyone would come to nothing, I keep it hidden; and people, I suppose, take me for a heartless woman.
Wasurenamu to omou kokoro no kanashiki wa uki mo ukaranu mono ni zo arikeru
The sorrow of a heart set on forgetting is such that what is hard to bear turns out, beside it, not to be hard at all.
Watatsumi to hito ya miruramu au koto no namida o fusa ni nakitsumetsureba
Will people take it for the sea itself? — since I have wept and heaped up here so many tears for meetings that will not come.
Itsu wa to wa wakanedo taete aki no yo zo mi no wabishisa wa shirimasarikeru
I could not say that one season is worse than another; and yet autumn nights are when the bleakness of my own case comes home to me.
Karisome no yukikaiji to zo omoishi o ima wa kagiri no kadode narikeru
A road for going and coming back, I thought it, and no more. And it turns out this was my last setting out.
Hamachidori tobiyuku kagiri arikereba kumo tatsu yama o awa to koso mire
A shore plover can fly only so far and no further; so I look at that cloud-crowned mountain from here and say only: ah, there it is.
Inochi dani kokoro ni kanau mono naraba nanika wakare no kanashikaramashi
If only our lives were ours to command, why should any parting be a sorrowful thing?
Asamidori kai aru haru ni ainureba kasumi naranedo tachinoborikeri
Pale green, and worth the meeting — this spring I have met; and though I am not the haze, I too have risen and stand here.
Sumiwabinu waga mi nagetemu Tsu no kuni no Ikuta no kawa wa na nomi narikeri
I am worn out with living; I shall throw myself in. The river of life at Ikuta, in Tsu, turns out to have been nothing but a name.
Kage to nomi mizu no shita nite aimiredo tama naki kara wa kai nakarikeri
Only her shape, and under the water at that, was what we met and saw; and a body with no soul in it was of no use at all.
Kagirinaku fukaku shizumeru waga tama wa ukitaru hito ni miemu mono ka wa
This soul of mine, sunk beyond all measure deep — is it a thing that one floating up on the surface could ever see?
Izuko ni ka tama o motomemu watatsumi no koko ka shiko to mo omooenaku ni
Where am I to look for that soul? In all this wide water I cannot tell one place from another.