Inochi areba kotoshi no aki mo tsuki wa mitsu wakareshi hito ni au yo naki kana

English Translation

Since I am alive,
this autumn as well
I have seen the moon—
but to meet the one I lost
there comes no night at all.

Meaning

Because I still live, I have seen the moon this autumn too—yet there is no night on which I may meet the one from whom death parted me.

Commentary

Book Eight Lament Poems 799

Headnote: "On seeing the moon in the year after Lord Minamoto no Tameyoshi died."
This is the twenty-fifth poem of the sequence remembering the dead through the things of autumn, and the last poem of that sequence. It says that because he is alive he has seen the moon this autumn too, yet there is no night on which to meet the one he parted from. According to the headnote, it was composed on seeing the moon in the year after Minamoto no Tameyoshi died.
The author's lay name was Tachibana no Nagayasu; he took holy orders and traveled through the provinces visiting places famed in poetry. He is one of the Thirty-Six Later Poetic Immortals. "Lord Minamoto no Tameyoshi" was an official of the mid-Heian period.
The scene is a moonlit autumn night in the year after Tameyoshi's death, and the place is not recorded.
The direct occasion is seeing the autumn moon in the year after Tameyoshi died.

In the first line, "inochi areba," "ba" expresses a realized condition, meaning "since I am alive." It sets at the opening the self that has survived.
In the second line, "kotoshi no aki mo," "mo" adds the sense "this year too, as last year."
In the third line, "tsuki wa mitsu," "tsu" marks completion, meaning "I have seen the moon." "Wa" singles out the moon, setting it against "meeting the person on a night" in the lower verse. The poem pauses after the third line.
The fourth line, "wakareshi hito ni," means "the one from whom I parted in death." "Shi" marks the past, pointing to Tameyoshi's death the year before.
In the last line, "au yo naki kana," "kana" is exclamatory. The night for seeing the moon has come round again this year, but the night for meeting the person will never come again. Following the dawn moon of the preceding poem, 798, it again sings of the moon; where the preceding poem counted the years from the side of the dead, this one counts a year from the side of the one left alive. The sequence remembering the dead through the things of autumn, which began with 775 of this book, closes with this poem.

Author

Nōin

Source

Shin Kokin Wakashu

Other