あるかひもなぎさに寄する白波の
間なく物思ふ我が身なりけり
間なく物思ふ我が身なりけり
- Roma-ji
-
Aru kai mo nagisa ni yosuru shiranami no ma naku monoomou waga mi narikeri
- English Translation
-
With no shell of worth,
no use, on the shore the white
waves come rolling in:
endlessly I brood in longing,
such has my own life become
- Meaning
- Like the white waves rolling onto a shore bare of shells, with nothing to make life worth living, I brood without a pause; such, I find, is my life.
- Commentary
-
Book Eleven Love Poems I 1066
Headnote: "Topic unknown."
This is the fourth poem of the sequence on unceasing longing sung through scenes of the water's edge and the sea. With nothing to make life worthwhile, the speaker broods without pause, like white waves breaking on the shore. The headnote gives no topic, and the circumstances of composition are not recorded.
The author, "Minamoto no Kageakira," was a poet of the mid-Heian period.
In the first line, "kai" pivots between "kai," worth, as in the worth of living, and "kai," a shell on the shore.
In the second line, "nagisa" pivots between "naki," without worth, and "nagisa," the shore.
The third line, "shiranami no," means "of the white waves breaking on the shore," and the first three lines form a preface leading to "ma naku."
The fourth line, "ma naku monoomou," means "brooding without pause." Like "nami no ma mo nashi" in 1064, Ise's poem, it lays longing over the ceaseless rolling of waves.
In the last line, "keri" marks realization: such is my life. The water's-edge sequence of the Naniwa hut, the rugged shore, and Suma Bay ends with white waves on the shore, and from the next poem on, loves sung through mountain scenes follow.
- Author
- Minamoto no Kageakira
- Source
- Shin Kokin Wakashu
- Prev Poem
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Suma no ura ni ama no koritsumu moshiogi no karaku mo shita ni moewataru kana
- Next Poem
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Ashihiki no yamashita tagitsu iwanami no kokoro kudakete hito zo koishiki