Ozasa fuku shizu no maroya no kari no to o akegata ni naku hototogisu kana

English Translation

Thatched with dwarf bamboo
the round hut of poor folk, and
its makeshift doorway
opening at break of day
where the cuckoo cries at dawn

Meaning

The rough round hut is thatched with dwarf bamboo, and the cuckoo, crying at daybreak, opens its makeshift door.

Commentary

Book Three Summer Poems 219

Headnote: on the theme of the cuckoo at dawn at a mountain house.
The topic is that phrase, and the scene is a poor house in the hills where the bird is heard at first light.
The poet, known by his office, is Fujiwara no Sanesada, who rose to Minister of the Left and was a nephew of Shunzei and a cousin of Teika. In Book One he is the poet of the thirty-fifth poem and in Book Two of the hundred and forty-first. He is also the man named in the headnote to the two hundred and tenth poem.
The time is a summer daybreak; the place is a rough house in the mountains.
The occasion was the set topic.

The first line means thatched with small bamboo; the prefix is merely rhythmic.
The second line names a person of low rank and a rough round hut, so that a plain mountain dwelling is set before us. It belongs with the brushwood door of Kunaikyo's hundred and seventy-third poem in Book Two.
The third line names a door put up for the time being.
The word in the fourth line means daybreak and also carries the verb for opening, so that one word holds both the coming of day and the opening of the door, with the door above as its object.
The poem closes on a noun with an exclamatory particle. The bird's cry is said to open the door of the hut, as though a voice could do physical work.

Author

Fujiwara no Sanesada

Source

Shin Kokin Wakashu

Other