蚊遣火のさ夜更けがたの下焦がれ
苦しや我が身人知れずのみ
苦しや我が身人知れずのみ
- Roma-ji
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Kayaribi no sayo fukegata no shitakogare kurushi ya waga mi hito shirezu nomi
- English Translation
-
Like the smudge fires
smoldering as the night grows late,
burning from below:
how it pains me, this self of mine,
unknown, always, to anyone
- Meaning
- Like a smudge fire smoldering low as the night deepens, I burn in secret. How it pains me, this self of mine, always unknown to anyone.
- Commentary
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Book Eleven Love Poems I 1070
Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Topic unknown."
This is the fourth poem of the sequence on love sung through mountains and summer fields. Like a smudge fire smoldering late at night, the speaker burns in secret, in pain, unknown to anyone. The headnote gives no topic, and the circumstances of composition are not recorded.
The author, "Sone no Yoshitada," was a poet of the mid-Heian period. Having served as Secretary of Tango, he was called Sotan, and he is known for poems using novel words and expressions. His personal collection is the Sotanshū.
In the first line, "kayaribi" is a fire lit to drive off mosquitoes.
The second line, "sayo fukegata no," means "as the night grows late," "sa" being a prefix.
The third line, "shitakogare," overlays a smudge fire smoldering low with a heart burning in secret. Like "oku kabi no shitakogaretsutsu" in 992, Hitomaro's poem, it entrusts love to the hidden smolder of the smudge fire. The poem breaks here.
The fourth line, "kurushi ya waga mi," means "how painful, this self of mine," in an inversion.
The last line, "hito shirezu nomi," means "always unknown to anyone." After the grasses of summer fields comes the smudge fire of a summer night, closing the sequence of love sung through summer scenes. The next poem is also by Yoshitada, sung through a boat crossing the strait of Yura.
- Author
- Sone no Yoshitada
- Source
- Shin Kokin Wakashu
- Prev Poem
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Oshika fusu natsuno no kusa no michi o nami shigeki koiji ni madou koro kana
- Next Poem
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Yura no to o wataru funabito kaji o tae yukue mo shiranu koi no michi kamo