Ima wa sawa ukiyo no saga no nobe o koso tsuyu kiehateshi ato to shinobame

English Translation

Now, then, it must be—
the way of this sorrowful world—
these fields of Saga
I will cherish as the place
where the dew has vanished all.

Meaning

Now, then, as the way of this sorrowful world, it is these fields of Saga that I will cherish as the place where the dew has vanished altogether.

Commentary

Book Eight Lament Poems 787

Headnote: "Composed on the night when I laid my mother, who had died, to rest near Sagano."
This is the thirteenth poem of the sequence remembering the dead through the things of autumn. It says that now, as the way of this sorrowful world, she will cherish the fields of Saga as the place where the dew has vanished altogether. According to the headnote, it was composed on the night her mother, who had died, was buried near Sagano.
The daughter of Hachijōin no Sanjō, Fujiwara no Shunzei's daughter, and Fujiwara no Moriyori, the author became the adopted daughter of her grandfather Shunzei. She was a woman poet active in the poetic circle of Retired Emperor Go-Toba.
The scene is the night her mother was buried, set near Sagano.
The direct occasion is burying her mother near Sagano.

In the first line, "ima wa sawa," "sawa" means "then." It is a way of drawing a line, "now that I have laid my mother to rest."
In the second line, "ukiyo no saga no," "saga" is a pivot word meaning both "saga," the way things must be in the world, and the place name Saga. From "as the way of this sorrowful world" it continues into the fields of Saga.
In the third line, "nobe o koso," "koso" is an emphatic binding particle, completed by "me" in the realis form in the last line. Following 785 and 786 of this book, it again sings of Sagano.
The fourth line, "tsuyu kiehateshi," means "where the dew has vanished altogether," likening her mother's death to dew that has vanished. "Shi" marks the past.
In the last line, "ato to shinobame," "ato" is what the dead leave behind, here the place where her mother was buried. "Me" is the realis form of the volitional auxiliary "mu," closing in response to "koso" in the third line as "I will cherish it as that place." Where 758 of this book sang of one's own end as the haze over the fields, here the fields are seen as the place where her mother's dew vanished. The three poems of Sagano are brought to a close with this poem.

Author

Shunzei's Daughter

Source

Shin Kokin Wakashu

Other