雪ふれば冬ごもりせる草も気も
春に知られぬ花ぞ咲きける
春に知られぬ花ぞ咲きける
- Roma-ji
-
Yuki fureba fuyugomori seru kusa mo ki mo
haru ni shirarenu hana zo sakikeru - English Translation
-
when the snow falls down
the grasses and hidden things
that lie through winter—
bear blossoms never seen in
the coming days of springtime
- Meaning
- When snow falls, even the grasses lying hidden through winter seem to bloom with flowers unseen in spring.
- Commentary
-
Book Six Winter Poems
This poem was composed as a winter poem.
The snow that settles upon grasses and plants is likened to blossoms. It expresses, in a clear and gentle way, a beauty of winter that cannot be seen in spring—the quiet flowering of the season through snow.
- Author
- Ki no Tsurayuki
- Source
- Kokin Wakashu
- Other
-
- my old dwelling lies so near to Mount Yoshino— not even a day passes without falling snow gracing it from the heavens
- at my humble dwelling snow falls thick and deep, and now no path can be seen— for there is no one at all to come and tread a way here
- white snow falling down without choosing where it lies— covering all alike even upon the rocky crags it seems that flowers bloom there
- on fair Yoshino the mountain snow must be piled— for in the old capital the cold grows ever deeper more than it was before