Yamazato no niwa yori hoka no michi mogana hana chirinu ya to hito mo koso toe

English Translation

If only there were
some road other than my own
garden's, in these hills
for someone may come to ask
whether the flowers have gone

Meaning

If only there were some road through this mountain village other than my garden: someone may come and ask whether the flowers have fallen.

Commentary

Book Two Spring Poems II 127

Headnote: as in the preceding poem, topic unknown.
At a mountain house whose garden serves as a thoroughfare, the poet would rather not be asked, once the flowers have gone, whether they have. The original gives no fresh headnote.
Echizen was a lady-in-waiting and poet in the service of Retired Emperor Go-Toba, though little is recorded of her life. In Book One she is the poet of the twenty-fourth poem.
The time is after the cherries have fallen; the place is a house in the hills.
The occasion of composition is not recorded.

The first two lines assume that the garden is a way through.
The particle in the third line expresses a wish: if only there were.
The fourth line quotes the question that might be asked: have the flowers fallen?
The construction closing the poem expresses apprehension: it would be too bad if someone did. The verb stands in the concessive form to complete it.
If asked after the fall, she would have to say that they have fallen, and she would rather avoid it: an oblique way of grieving. The hundred and twenty-fifth poem lamented that callers had stopped; this one finds their coming troublesome, taking the same situation from the other side.

Author

Echizen

Source

Shin Kokin Wakashu

Other