Suma no ama no namikakegoromo yoso ni nomi kiku wa waga mi ni narinikeru kana - Shin Kokin Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

須磨の海人の波かけ衣よそにのみ
聞くは我が身になりにけるかな

Roma-ji: Suma no ama no namikakegoromo yoso ni nomi kiku wa waga mi ni narinikeru kana
English Translation: At Suma, the robes
of fisherfolk that waves drench,
something far away
I only heard of, has become
now my own life, it seems
Meaning: The wave-drenched robes of the fisherfolk of Suma, which I had only heard of as something far removed from me, have now become my own.
Commentary: Book Eleven Love Poems I 1041

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Topic unknown."
This is the second poem of the sequence on sleeves wet with tears sung through seashore scenes. The wave-drenched robes of the fisherfolk of Suma, once only heard of as another's lot, have become the speaker's own, a sleeve wet with love's tears. The headnote gives no topic, and the circumstances of composition are not recorded.
The author, "Michinobu Ason," is Fujiwara no Michinobu. A son of the Chancellor Fujiwara no Tamemitsu, he was adopted by Fujiwara no Kaneie. He rose to Middle Captain of the Left Palace Guards but died young at twenty-three.

In the first line, Suma is a shore in Settsu, in present-day Suma Ward, Kobe, a poetic place sung for the lonely dwellings of fisherfolk who burned seaweed for salt. The line has an extra syllable at six.
The second line, "namikakegoromo," means a robe splashed by waves, a garment that never has time to dry.
The third line, "yoso ni nomi," means "only as something far away," the same words as the first line of 990.
The fourth line, "kiku wa waga mi ni," means "what I heard of has come upon myself."
The last line closes with the exclamatory "kana." Where Tsurayuki's preceding poem likens the sleeve to a rocky shore, this one likens it to a fisher's robe, sung as another's lot that has become the speaker's own. In a book that began with a love seen "yoso ni nomi," from afar, what was far away has turned into one's own.
Author: Fujiwara no Michinobu
Source: Shin Kokin Wakashu
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