Furusato no motoara no kohagi sakishi yori yonayona niwa no tsuki zo utsurou

English Translation

In the old village
since the sparse-rooted clover
came into flower
night by night in the garden
the moon has been moving on

Meaning

Since the thin-rooted clover came into flower in the old village, night after night the moon has shifted across the garden.

Commentary

Book Four Autumn Poems I 393

Headnote: on grasses and flowers before the moon, from the time when he presented a fifty-poem sequence.
The eighteenth poem on the moon. The topic is plants seen against the moon, and the poem measures the nights since the clover opened by the moon's changing place.
The poet, given as Regent and Chancellor, is Fujiwara no Yoshitsune; he appears in this book at the two hundred and ninety-third, three hundred and fifty-sixth and others.
The time is a night in autumn; the place is the garden of an old village.
The occasion was the presentation of the fifty poems.

The first line names an old village or an old dwelling, the word that runs through the spring poems of this anthology and appears in this book at the two hundred and ninety-third, three hundred and thirty-seventh and seventy-fourth poems.
The word in the second line means thin at the root: low clover growing sparsely.
The third line means: since it came into flower. The opening of the clover is the point from which time is measured.
The word in the fourth line means every night, used in Yoshitsune's own three hundred and seventy-third poem.
An emphatic particle governs the verb at the close, which means both to shift position and to fade in colour, the word used in Ietaka's three hundred and eighty-ninth poem. The moon's nightly change of place counts the days since the flowering, and plant and moon are joined as a measure of time.

Author

Fujiwara no Yoshitsune

Source

Shin Kokin Wakashu

Other