Hitozute ni shirasete shigana kakurenu no migomori ni nomi koi ya wataran - Shin Kokin Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

人づてに知らせてしがな隠れ沼の
みごもりにのみ恋ひやわたらん

Roma-ji: Hitozute ni shirasete shigana kakurenu no migomori ni nomi koi ya wataran
English Translation: If only I could
let you know by someone's word!
Like a hidden marsh,
sunk beneath its waters, must
I go on loving unseen?
Meaning: If only I could let you know, even through someone else! Must I go on loving like a hidden marsh, my feelings sunk beneath the water where no one sees?
Commentary: Book Eleven Love Poems I 1001

Headnote: "At a poetry contest in the reign of Tenryaku."
This is the first poem of a sequence on hidden love. The speaker wishes to make his feelings known even through another, and laments that he may go on loving in secret, like a marsh whose waters lie hidden. According to the headnote, it was composed at a poetry contest in the Tenryaku reign.
The author, "Middle Counselor Asatada," is Fujiwara no Asatada. A son of Fujiwara no Sadakata, the Sanjō Minister of the Right, he rose to Middle Counselor of the Junior Third Rank. He is one of the Thirty-Six Poetic Immortals.
"The reign of Tenryaku" refers to the rule of Emperor Murakami, Tenryaku being an era name of his reign.

The first line, "hitozute ni," means "through someone else," showing a feeling that cannot be spoken directly.
In the second line, "teshigana" expresses a wish: if only I could let you know. The poem breaks after this line.
In the third line, "kakurenu" is a marsh whose surface is hidden by grasses, leading into "migomori."
In the fourth line, "migomori" means being hidden beneath the water, a figure for love kept within the heart.
In the last line, "ya" poses a question resolved by "ran." It shares its last line with 993, the poem by Hitomaro, echoing the lament of a love that goes on unseen. The next poem opens with "migomori no," taking up this poem's fourth line, so that poems of hidden love follow one upon another.
Author: Fujiwara no Asatada
Source: Shin Kokin Wakashu
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