While I grieve and ask
if that dream night comes again,
not even our eyes
have been allowed to meet now,
and the days have worn away

Meaning

While I grieve and wonder whether that dreamlike night will ever come again, the days have gone by without so much as our eyes meeting.

Commentary

Part One: Hahakigi

　Refused again and again, Genji took Utsusemi's young brother Kogimi into his personal service, hoping to reach her through him. The boy grew attached to him and did as he was told, but his sister kept her heart firmly shut. Letter after letter went unanswered, and at last Genji sent this poem. She did not reply to this one either, and his longing only grew.

　"The dream I saw" is the night he spent with her, and speaking of a real event as a dream carries the sense that it cannot come again. "Me sae awade" means not even being able to meet her eyes, laying "to meet" over "to match," and saying that so far from another night together, he cannot even look at her. Rather than reproach, the poem states the helplessness of watching time simply pass.

Author

Murasaki Shikibu

Source

Genji Monogatari

Other

While I grieve and ask if that dream night comes again, not even our eyes have been allowed to meet now, and the days have worn away

While I grieve and ask
if that dream night comes again,
not even our eyes
have been allowed to meet now,
and the days have worn away