Hototogisu itsu ka to machishi ayamegusa kyō wa ika naru ne ni ka nakubeki - Shin Kokin Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

ほととぎすいつかと待ちしあやめ草
今日はいかなるねにか鳴くべき

Roma-ji: Hototogisu itsu ka to machishi ayamegusa kyō wa ika naru ne ni ka nakubeki
English Translation: The cuckoo waited,
wondering when it would come,
the iris day:
now that it is here, with what
kind of root-cry should I weep?
Meaning: The day of irises that the cuckoo waited for so long has come at last. Today, with what sort of cry, what root of the iris, should I weep?
Commentary: Book Eleven Love Poems I 1043

Headnote: "Sent to Uma no Naishi on the fifth day of the Fifth Month."
This is the second poem of the sequence on love sung through the things of the Fifth Month. On the iris festival the cuckoo has long awaited, the poet asks with what cry he should weep, playing on the iris root. According to the headnote, it was sent to Uma no Naishi on the fifth day of the Fifth Month.
The author, "Former Major Counselor Kintō," is Fujiwara no Kintō. A son of the Regent and Chancellor Fujiwara no Yoritada, he rose to Provisional Major Counselor. Gifted in Chinese verse, waka, and music, he compiled the Wakan Rōeishū.
Uma no Naishi was a lady-in-waiting and poet of the mid-Heian period, one of the Later Thirty-Six Poetic Immortals.
The next poem is Uma no Naishi's reply to this one.

The first line, "hototogisu," names the bird longed for as the singer of the Fifth Month; here the poet lays himself over the one who cries.
The second line, "itsu ka to machishi," means "that waited, wondering when."
The third line, "ayamegusa," stands for the festival of the fifth day of the Fifth Month. The cuckoo and the iris were paired as things of the Fifth Month, as in the poem that opens Love Poems I of the Kokin Wakashū: "hototogisu / naku ya satsuki no / ayamegusa / ayame mo shiranu / koi mo suru kana."
In the fourth line, "ne" pivots between the root of the iris and "ne," the sound of crying. The question particle "ka" is resolved by "beki" in the last line.
The last line, "nakubeki," means "should I cry," carrying the sense of weeping for love. After Sakon's preceding poem entrusted the heart to an iris root, this one plays on root and cry to ask how to weep for love.
Author: Fujiwara no Kintō
Source: Shin Kokin Wakashu
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