Kaku shitsutsu kurenuru aki to oinuredo shikasuga ni nao mono zo kanashiki

English Translation

Passing thus the years,
growing old with each autumn
that has reached its end—
even so, nonetheless, still
things fill my heart with sorrow

Meaning

Living on like this, I have grown old along with the autumns that come to their close—and yet, even so, things still fill me with sorrow.

Commentary

Book Five Autumn Poems II 548

Headnote: "At the end of autumn, when I had something weighing on my mind."
This is the second poem of the sequence on autumn's end. The speaker has grown old along with the autumns that end, yet autumn's close still brings sorrow. According to the headnote, it was composed at the end of autumn when the author had something weighing on his mind.
No author's name is given for this poem, which is placed as Nōin's, continuing the attribution of the preceding poem. The author's lay name was Tachibana no Nagayasu; after taking vows he lived at Kosobe in Settsu Province and traveled the provinces composing poems. He is one of the Thirty-six Poetic Immortals of the Middle Ages.
The scene is the end of autumn, in the author's surroundings.
The direct occasion was having something troubling on his mind at autumn's end.

The first line, "kaku shitsutsu," means "repeating it thus," showing the years of seeing autumn off time after time.
In the second line, "to" means "along with": "along with the autumns that end." It opens by taking up the last line of 547, "autumn has come to its end."
In the third line, "nure" is the realis of the perfective "nu" and "do" concessive: "though I have grown old." The poem breaks here.
In the fourth line, "shikasuga ni" means "even so" and "nao" "still," showing an unchanged sorrow in a heart that should have grown used to it with age.
In the last line, the emphatic "zo" is resolved by "kanashiki," the attributive of the adjective "kanashi." Having seen autumn off so many times, and grown as many years older, the speaker should be accustomed—yet autumn's end still brings sorrow, a pathos unchanged over long years. Where 547 grasped one autumn's end within the span of a year, this poem grasps the many autumn endings accumulated over a lifetime, singing of the same close of autumn on a different scale.

Author

Nōin

Source

Shin Kokin Wakashu

Other