Fuyu no yo no nagaki o okuru sode nurenu akatsukigata no yomo no arashi ni

English Translation

Through the winter night,
seeing its long hours pass,
my sleeves are wet—
in the hour before the dawn
with storm winds on every side

Meaning

Passing the long hours of the winter night, my sleeves have grown wet—in the hour before dawn, with storm winds blowing from every side.

Commentary

Book Six Winter Poems 614

Headnote: "Among winter poems."
This is the fourth poem of the frost-and-withering sequence. The sleeves of one who has passed the long winter night have grown wet in the hour before dawn, amid storm winds blowing from every side. According to the headnote, it is one of a group of poems composed on winter.
The author, "the Retired Emperor," is Retired Emperor Go-Toba. A son of Emperor Takakura, he governed as retired emperor after abdicating, established the Bureau of Poetry, and commanded the compilation of the Shin Kokin Wakashū.
The scene is the hour before dawn on a winter night, and the place is where storm winds blow from every side.
The direct occasion is not recorded beyond the headnote's "among winter poems."

The first line, "fuyu no yo no," modifies "nagaki," long, in the second line.
The second line, "nagaki o okuru," means "passing the long hours," showing that the speaker has spent the whole length of the winter night.
The third line, "sode nurenu," means "my sleeves have grown wet," with "nu" as a perfective auxiliary. The poem breaks after the third line, in inverted relation to the lower verse.
The fourth line, "akatsukigata no," means "of the hour before dawn."
The last line, "yomo no arashi ni," means "amid the storm winds from every side," revealing at the end the time and circumstance in which the sleeves grew wet. At dawn after a long winter night, the loneliness of hearing storms on every side is shown to wet the sleeves with tears. From the cold of the cranes on a frosty night in the preceding poem, the poem moves to the sleeves of one who has passed a long winter night, and the next poem, 615, also sings of frost in the deep mountains swept by storm.

Author

Go-Toba In

Source

Shin Kokin Wakashu

Other