- Top
- -
- Gosen Wakashu
Kore ya kono yuku mo kaeru mo wakaretsutsu shiru mo shiranu mo ausaka no seki
So this is that famous place—where those leaving and those returning part again and again, and friends and strangers alike meet: the Barrier of Ōsaka, the Slope of Meeting.
Gosen Wakashu - Semimaru
Ama no sumu ura kogu fune no kaji o nami yo o umi wataru ware zo kanashiki
Like a boat rowing along the bay where the fisherfolk live, with no oar to guide it, I cross this weary sea of a world—how sorrowful I am.
Gosen Wakashu - Ono no Komachi
Hamachidori kai nakarikeri tsure mo naki hito no atari wa nakiwataredomo
Like a plover on the beach that finds no shells, it has brought me nothing, though I go crying back and forth around the one who is so cold to me.
Gosen Wakashu - Unknown Poet
Kono miyuki chitose kaete mo miteshi kana kakaru yamabushi toki ni aubeku
This royal progress I would wish to see again, though a thousand years should turn and turn, so that a mountain monk like me might meet with such a moment.
Gosen Wakashu - Sosei Hoshi
Oto ni kiku matsugaurashima kyō zo miru mube mo kokoro aru ama wa sumikeri
Matsugaurashima, the isle of pines I had so often heard of—today at last I see it. No wonder, then, that one of fine feeling dwells here, a fisher, or rather a nun.
Gosen Wakashu - Sosei Hoshi
Ware nomi wa tachi mo kaeranu akatsuki ni wakite mo okeru sode no tsuyu kana
On this dawn, when I alone neither went forth nor came back, the dew has settled, of all places, especially upon my sleeve.
Gosen Wakashu - Uemon
Shio to ieba nakute mo karaki yo no naka ni ikade aetaru tatami naruran
Speaking of salt—this world is bitter enough even without it, so how could there be any tatami that has been dressed and seasoned?
Gosen Wakashu - Tatami
Sumiyoshi no kishi to mo iwaji okitsunami nao uchikake yo ura wa naku tomo
I will not speak of Sumiyoshi's shore, nor say it was worn; waves of the offing, cast yourselves over me all the same, though there be no bay—no lining.
Gosen Wakashu - Fujiwara no Motosuke
Koto no ha ni taesenu tsuyu wa okuramu ya mukashi oboyuru madoi shitareba
On the leaves of our words, might there be settling a dew of tears that never ceases? For here we sit together in a circle that brings back the days of old.
Gosen Wakashu - Fujiwara no Onshi
Umi to nomi madoi no naka wa narinumeri sonagara aranu kage no miyureba
The circle where we sit has become nothing but a sea of tears, it seems—for we see a figure who is the very same, and yet not the same at all.
Gosen Wakashu - Ise
Nani sen ni heta no mirume o omoiken okitsu tamamo o kazuku mi ni shite
Why ever did I long for the seaweed by the shore—for Miru—when I am one who dives for, and is given, the jewel weed of the open sea?
Gosen Wakashu - Ōtomo no Kuronushi
Hiru nare ya mi zo magaetsuru tsukikage o kyō to ya iwamu kinō to ya iwan
Is it daytime? So I mistook this moonlight. Shall I call this hour today, or shall I call it yesterday?
Gosen Wakashu - Oshikochi no Mitsune
Kuyashiku zo amatsu otome to narinikeru kumoji tazunuru hito mo naki yo ni
How bitter that I became a heavenly maiden, in a world where there is no one to come seeking me along the paths of the clouds.
Gosen Wakashu - Daughter of Fujiwara no Shigekane
Hito no oya no kokoro wa yami ni aranedomo ko o omou michi ni madoinuru kana
A parent's heart is not a thing of darkness, and yet on the path of thinking of one's child, how easily one loses one's way.
Gosen Wakashu - Fujiwara no Kanesuke
Naniwagata nani ni mo arazu miotsukushi fukaki kokoro no shirushi bakari zo
Like the channel markers of Naniwa Bay, it is nothing much—only a token of a heart that would give its all, as deep as the waters they mark.
Gosen Wakashu - Daughter of Ōe no Tamabuchi
Akete dani nani ni ka wa mimu mizunoe no urashima no ko o omoiyaritsutsu
Even if it were opened, what would there be to see? I keep thinking all the while of the child of Urashima from the Bay of Mizunoe.
Gosen Wakashu - Nakatsukasa