Honoka ni mo kaze wa fukanamu hanasusuki musubōretsutsu tsuyu ni nuru tomo

English Translation

Only faintly, though
I would have the wind blow here
on the plumes of grass
though they tangle as they go
and are soaked through by the dew

Meaning

Let the wind blow, if only faintly, on the plumed grass, though it tangle and be soaked with dew.

Commentary

Book Four Autumn Poems I 348

Headnote: as in the preceding poem, topic unknown.
The third poem on pampas grass. Where the previous poem had the grass barely visible, this one asks that the wind blow at least a little. The original gives no fresh headnote.
The poet, given by her rank, is Princess Kishi, a daughter of Prince Shigeakira. She served as High Priestess at Ise and afterwards became a consort of Emperor Murakami. This is her second appearance in this book, after the three hundred and twenty-fifth poem.
The time is autumn; the place is where pampas grass grows.
The occasion of composition is not recorded.

The first line takes up the word for faintly from the previous poem. There it described how a thing was seen and here how the wind blows: the same word moved to another object.
The particle in the second line expresses a wish directed at another: let it blow.
The third line names the grass.
The verb in the fourth line means to be tangled and not come free, used of firelight in Jakuren's two hundred and fifty-second poem in Book Three. Here it describes the plumes catching on one another.
The particle at the close marks a concessive supposition. Yoen's three hundred and thirtieth poem ends on the same words, so that two poems share a close. To want the wind although it will bring wetting is to want the sight of the grass bending; where the three hundred and nineteenth poem made the wind a spoiler, here it is what is waited for.

Author

Princess Kishi

Source

Shin Kokin Wakashu

Other