Mikanohara wakite nagaruru Izumigawa itsu miki tote ka koishikaruran - Shin Kokin Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

みかの原わきて流るる泉川
いつ見きとてか恋しかるらん

Roma-ji: Mikanohara wakite nagaruru Izumigawa itsu miki tote ka koishikaruran
English Translation: Mika's broad plain,
welling up and parting it,
the Izumi flows:
when was it I saw you, that
I should long for you like this?
Meaning: Like the Izumi River that wells up and flows dividing the plain of Mika, when was it that I saw you, that I should long for you so?
Commentary: Book Eleven Love Poems I 996

Headnote: "Topic unknown."
This is the first poem of a sequence on love for someone not yet met. From the name of the Izumi River the poem draws out "itsu miki," "when did I see," and asks why the speaker longs so for someone never really met. The headnote gives no topic, and the circumstances of composition are not recorded.
The author, "Middle Counselor Kanesuke," is Fujiwara no Kanesuke. A son of Fujiwara no Toshimoto, Middle Captain of the Right, he rose to Middle Counselor of the Junior Third Rank. His mansion on the bank of the Kamo River earned him the name Tsutsumi Chūnagon, the Middle Counselor of the Embankment, and he was the great-grandfather of Murasaki Shikibu.
The poem was chosen by Fujiwara no Teika for the Ogura Hyakunin Isshu.

In the first line, the plain of Mika lies in Sagara District of Yamashiro, in present-day Kizugawa City, Kyoto, where the Kuni capital was built in the Nara period.
In the second line, "wakite" pivots between "wakite," dividing the plain as it flows, and "wakite," welling up from the ground.
The third line, "Izumigawa," is today's Kizu River. "Izumi," a spring, is associated with welling, and the first three lines form a preface that leads by repeated sound to "itsu mi."
In the fourth line, the question particle "ka" is resolved by "ran" in the last line. "When was it I saw you?" carries the feeling of never having met at all.
In the last line, "ran" conjectures a cause: why should I long like this? The speaker puzzles over the heart itself, and the endless welling water overlaps with overflowing love. After the poems sent to women, the frustration of love before meeting now continues, and the next poem closes with "awanu kimi kana."
Author: Fujiwara no Kanesuke
Source: Shin Kokin Wakashu
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