Kirigirisu yosamu ni aki no naru mama ni yowaru ka koe no tōzakari yuku

English Translation

The cricket's chirping
as autumn turns to the chill
of the nights draws on—
is it weakening? its voice
grows fainter, drifting away

Meaning

As autumn deepens into chilly nights, is the cricket growing weak? Its voice seems to be drifting farther away.

Commentary

Book Five Autumn Poems II 472

Headnote: "Topic unknown."
This is the first poem of the insect sequence. As the nights grow cold, the cricket seems to weaken, and its voice drifts farther away. The headnote gives no topic, and the circumstances of composition are not recorded.
The author's lay name was Satō Norikiyo; a guardsman of the North Office under Retired Emperor Toba, he took vows at twenty-three and traveled the provinces composing poems. His personal collection is the Sankashū.
The scene is a late-autumn night as the cold deepens, near a dwelling where crickets sing.
The direct occasion is not recorded.

The first line, "kirigirisu," is the insect now called the cricket (kōrogi). With the dew sequence ended, the poems turn to insects.
In the second line, "yosamu" is the chill felt at night as autumn deepens.
The third line, "naru mama ni," means "as it becomes," showing the passage of time. It is the same phrase as in 451, where, as the leaves fell, the deer's sounds came to be heard from deep within; here, as the cold grows, the insect's voice recedes, contrasting a sound drawing near with one fading away.
In the fourth line, "ka" is interrogative, guessing whether the insect has weakened; there is a pause here.
The last line means the voice gradually recedes. The insect does not actually move away; its thinning voice is heard as distance, and the loneliness of autumn's approaching end is expressed through that change in sound.

Author

Saigyō

Source

Shin Kokin Wakashu

Other