Koto toe yo omoi okitsu no hamachidori nakunaku ideshi ato no tsukikage

English Translation

Ask for me, I pray,
plovers on the Okitsu shore
where I left my heart,
of the moonlight I left behind
when I set out weeping so.

Meaning

Plovers on the shore of Okitsu, where I left my heart behind, crying as I cried when I set out, ask for me after the moonlight lingering where I departed.

Commentary

Book Ten Travel Poems 934

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "A travel poem from the fifty-poem sequences composed at the residence of Prince Shukaku."
This is the fifth of a sequence of poems on the moon seen on a journey. The speaker calls on the plovers of Okitsu to ask after the moonlight left behind where he set out in tears, looking back at a place he has left. According to the headnote, it is a travel poem from the fifty-poem sequences composed at the residence of Prince Shukaku.
The author, Fujiwara no Teika, was a son of Fujiwara no Shunzei and a poet of the early Kamakura period. He was one of the compilers of the Shin Kokin Wakashū and later compiled the Shin Chokusen Wakashū.
The scene is looking back after setting out on a journey, on the shore of Okitsu in Suruga Province.
The direct occasion is the travel topic in the fifty-poem sequences composed at the residence of Prince Shukaku. Prince Shukaku was a son of Emperor Go-Shirakawa and the abbot of Ninnaji.

The first line, "koto toe yo," means "ask, I pray." Closing in the imperative, the poem breaks after the first line and calls to the plovers that follow. The device of asking a bird has a precedent in Ariwara no Narihira's poem on the capital bird in the Kokin Wakashū, on which 908 also drew.
In the second line, "omoi okitsu no," "okitsu" carries both "oki," to leave one's heart behind, and Okitsu, a famous place in Suruga Province.
The third line, "hamachidori," is a call to the plovers on the shore.
In the fourth line, "nakunaku ideshi," "naku" carries both the plovers' "crying" and the speaker's setting out "weeping." The past "shi" looks back to the moment of departure.
The last line, "ato no tsukikage," means "the moonlight left behind," ending on a noun. Where the preceding poem vows to return with "tachikaeri mata mo kite min," this poem has the plovers ask after the moonlight of the place left behind, setting side by side hearts that think of places left. The last line of the next poem is "sode no tsukikage," so the two end on the same word, "tsukikage."

Author

Fujiwara no Teika

Source

Shin Kokin Wakashu

Other