Shirakumo o tsubasa ni kakete yuku kari no kadota no omo no tomo shitau naru

English Translation

Bearing the white clouds
upon their wings as they go,
the wild geese in flight
call for friends left on the fields
before the gate, so it seems

Meaning

Carrying the white clouds on their wings as they fly, the wild geese seem to call longingly to their companions on the paddies before the gate.

Commentary

Book Five Autumn Poems II 502

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Topic unknown."
This is the sixth poem of the wild goose sequence. Geese flying with white clouds on their wings seem to cry longingly for companions left on the paddies before the gate. The headnote, continued from the preceding poem, gives no topic, and the circumstances of composition are not recorded.
No author's name is given for this poem, which is placed as Saigyō's, continuing the attribution of the preceding poem. 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 autumn as the geese migrate, in a village with rice paddies spread before the gates.
The direct occasion is not recorded.

The first line gives the object of "tsubasa ni kakete" in the second line.
The second line depicts flying through the clouds as though hanging the white clouds on one's wings. The same conceit appears in "bearing on their wings the peak's clouds" in 506.
The third line, "the geese that go," gives the subject of "shitau" in the last line.
In the fourth line, "kadota" is the paddy before a house's gate and "omo" its surface. Like "the paddies of Toba" in 503, it sets the scene on the surface of fields.
In the last line, "naru" is the attributive of "nari," the auxiliary of inference from sound, and ending on the attributive leaves a lingering resonance. The cry of geese flying high is heard as longing for companions that have settled on the paddies below. There is a contrast of high and low—geese in the sky, geese on the fields—and following the first geese crossing the mountains in 501, the poem hears in their cries the sorrow of a flock divided.

Author

Saigyō

Source

Shin Kokin Wakashu

Other