やよやまて山郭公事づてむ
我世の中にすみわびぬとよ
我世の中にすみわびぬとよ
- Roma-ji
-
Yayo ya mate yamahototogisu kotozutemu
ware yo no naka ni sumiwabinu to yo - English Translation
-
Ah, wait a while—
o cuckoo returning
to the mountain home;
bear a message for me:
I am weary of this world.
- Meaning
- Ah, wait a while, O cuckoo returning to the mountains; carry a message for me—that I have grown weary of living in this world.
- Commentary
-
Book III, Summer Poems
A poem from the end of the cuckoo’s season.
It expresses a feeling of weariness with the world, though not in a deeply desperate sense.
- Author
- Mikuni no Machi
- Source
- Kokin Wakashu
- Other
-
- From mountain depths, the cuckoos come and cry, one after another— as though asking aloud, who among them surpasses all.
- Do not now return to the mountains, cuckoo bird— you have come at last; as long as your voice endures, cry here at my dwelling.
- In early summer rain, as I dwell in troubled thought, the cuckoo at night, cries deep into the darkness— whither has it flown away?
- Is it the dark night, or has it lost its way? the cuckoo cries on, unable to pass beyond my dwelling, lingering there.