Oi no nami koekeru mi koso aware nare kotoshi mo ima wa sue no matsuyama

English Translation

How moving it is,
this body that has crossed
the waves of age—
this year too is now at its end,
the Pine Hill of Sue

Meaning

How moving it is, this body that has passed over wave after wave of old age—and now this year too has reached its end, like the waves that cross the Pine Hill of Sue.

Commentary

Book Six Winter Poems 705

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Composed on the spirit of 'Year's End by the Sea' at the house of the Tsuchimikado Palace Minister."
This is the fifteenth poem of the year's-end sequence. The speaker is moved by his own body, which has crossed wave after wave of old age, and says that this year too has now reached its end. The headnote continues from the preceding poem, and this poem was composed on the topic "Year's End by the Sea" at the same house of the Tsuchimikado Palace Minister Minamoto no Michichika.
The author, "Jakuren Hōshi," is Jakuren. His lay name was Fujiwara no Sadanaga; a nephew of Fujiwara no Shunzei, he was adopted as Shunzei's son but later took holy orders. He was chosen as a compiler of the Shin Kokin Wakashū but died before the compilation was completed.
The scene is the end of the year, and the place is the Pine Hill of Sue in Michinoku Province.
As with the preceding poem, the direct occasion is the topic "Year's End by the Sea" at the house of the Tsuchimikado Palace Minister Minamoto no Michichika.
The image of waves crossing the Pine Hill of Sue draws on the Eastern poem in the Kokin Wakashū: "Kimi o okite adashi kokoro o waga motaba Sue no Matsuyama nami mo koenamu" (Should I ever leave you and give my heart to another, then the waves would cross even the Pine Hill of Sue).

The first line, "oi no nami," is a phrase likening old age to waves that come in and pile one upon another. It is set here as a word in keeping with the "seashore" of the topic.
The second line, "koekeru mi koso," means "this body that has crossed the waves of age," with "keru" as the attributive form of the past auxiliary "keri" and "koso" a binding particle.
The third line, "aware nare," means "is deeply moving," a kakari-musubi construction in which "koso" is answered by the perfective form. The poem breaks after the third line.
The fourth line, "kotoshi mo ima wa," means "and now this year too."
The last line, "sue no matsuyama," names a poetic place in Michinoku Province, the Pine Hill of Sue, around present-day Tagajō in Miyagi Prefecture. "Sue" carries both the "end" of the year and the place name. In the Eastern poem of the Kokin Wakashū it was an image for vowing unchanging love, a hill the waves would never cross, but in this poem it serves as an image showing that to a body that has crossed the waves of old age, the end of yet another year has come. A poem on the same topic of year's end by the sea as the preceding poem, it continues from the waves of Oshima to the waves crossing the Pine Hill of Sue, and stands just before the closing poem of the book, 706.

Author

Jakuren

Source

Shin Kokin Wakashu

Other