Fukuru made nagamureba koso kanashikere omoi mo ireji aki no yo no tsuki

English Translation

It is only when
I gaze at it till the night
deepens that it hurts
I shall give it no more thought
the moon of an autumn night

Meaning

It is because I gaze until the night grows late that it is sad. I will put my heart into it no longer: the autumn moon.

Commentary

Book Four Autumn Poems I 417

Headnote: as in the preceding poem, topic unknown.
Following the previous poem, this one resolves to stop looking. The original gives neither a fresh headnote nor a fresh attribution.
The poet is Princess Shokushi, as in the previous poem.
The time is a night in autumn; no place is given.
The occasion of composition is not recorded.

The first line means: until the night grows late.
An emphatic particle in the second line governs the concessive form in the third, isolating the cause: it is because of the gazing. As Yoshitsune's three hundred and fifty-ninth poem traced the dew back to its cause, this one assigns the sadness to the poet's own act.
The third line completes the construction.
The phrase in the fourth line means to put one's heart into a thing, with an auxiliary of negative intention: the cause being known, she resolves to stop.
The poem closes on a noun. The previous poem showed the regret through a supposition; this one resolves to cut it off. Two poems by one hand stand together, the feeling and the decision to end it.

Author

Princess Shokushi

Source

Shin Kokin Wakashu

Other