Mi ni kaete iza sa wa aki o oshimimin sarade mo moroki tsuyu no inochi o

English Translation

Even at the price
of my own life, come, let me
grieve for autumn's end—
even without that, my life
is as frail as the dewdrops

Meaning

Come, let me mourn the autumn even at the cost of my life—for even without that, my life is as fragile as dew.

Commentary

Book Five Autumn Poems II 549

Headnote: "When I had fifty-poem sequences composed."
This is the third poem of the sequence on autumn's end. Since life is as fragile as dew in any case, the poet resolves to mourn autumn even at the cost of his own life. According to the headnote, it is from the fifty-poem sequences the author commissioned from poets.
The author was a son of Emperor Go-Shirakawa who became abbot of Ninnaji.
The scene is autumn's end, in the author's surroundings.
The direct occasion was composing this poem himself within the fifty-poem sequences he commissioned from poets.

The first line, "mi ni kaete," means "in exchange for my own life," showing a feeling strong enough to stake one's life on.
In the second line, "iza" is "come," urging oneself, and "sa wa" means "if so, then."
In the third line, "n" is the volitional "mu": "let me try mourning it." The poem breaks here. Following 548's lament that autumn's end still grieves even in old age, this poem declares the will to mourn autumn.
The fourth line, "sarade mo moroki," means "fragile even without that"—fragile to begin with, whether or not one mourns autumn.
In the last line, "tsuyu no inochi" is a life as fleeting as dew, and "o" can be read as exclamatory or as carrying a concessive sense, "though it is." Since life is as frail as dew anyway, the poet would spend it mourning autumn—weighing life against autumn to show how deep the regret runs. Dew, linked with tears and brooding since the dew sequence beginning at 461, here becomes a figure for life's fragility, overlaying autumn's end with human life. The next poem, 550, closes the book with the same regret: "I mourn it."

Author

Cloistered Prince Shukaku

Source

Shin Kokin Wakashu

Other