Kannazuki kaze ni momiji no chiru toki wa sokowaka to naku mono zo kanashiki

English Translation

In the Godless Month,
when the autumn leaves are scattered
by the passing wind,
for no reason I can name
all things seem so sad to me

Meaning

In the Godless Month, when the autumn leaves are scattered by the wind, a sorrow I cannot trace to any cause settles over everything.

Commentary

Book Six Winter Poems 552

Headnote: "When poems were presented in the reign of Tenryaku with the words 'Godless Month' placed at the beginning."
This is the second poem of the early-winter sequence. It says that when the autumn leaves are scattered by the wind in the Godless Month, a nameless sadness arises. According to the headnote, it was presented in the Tenryaku era of Emperor Murakami with the words "Godless Month" placed at the start of the poem.
The author, "Fujiwara no Takamitsu," is Fujiwara no Takamitsu. A son of the Minister of the Right Fujiwara no Morosuke, he took holy orders on Mount Hiei while still young, later lived at Tōnomine, and was known as the Tōnomine Lesser Captain. He is one of the Thirty-Six Poetic Immortals.
The scene is the Godless Month, the tenth month of the lunar calendar, and the place is wherever the autumn leaves scatter in the wind.
The direct occasion is a presentation of poems in the Tenryaku era of Emperor Murakami, composed on the device of setting the words "Godless Month" in the first line.

The first line, "Kannazuki," is another name for the tenth lunar month, the first month of winter. Just as the headnote directs with "placed at the beginning," the topic word is set directly in the first line.
The second line, "kaze ni momiji no," speaks of autumn leaves blown by the wind. The leaves, the last remnant of autumn, are placed in the winter wind.
In the third line, "chiru toki wa," the particle "wa" singles out this moment from all others, adding the limitation "just at the time when the leaves scatter."
The fourth line, "sokowaka to naku," describes something that cannot be pinned down in words. By leaving the cause of sorrow unspecified, the poem presents the feeling as rising from the scene itself.
The last line, "mono zo kanashiki," is a kakari-musubi construction in which the particle "zo" is answered by "kanashiki," the attributive form of the adjective "kanashi." Poem 548 in Book Five also ends with "mono zo kanashiki," voicing the sadness of autumn's end, so the same last line is carried from the close of autumn into the beginning of winter. Poem 564 in this book shares the same last line, singing of dusk in a mountain village where the leaves whirl in disarray.

Author

Fujiwara no Takamitsu

Source

Shin Kokin Wakashu

Other