Nabikaji na ama no moshiobi takisomete keburi wa sora ni kuyuri wabu tomo - Shin Kokin Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

なびかじな海人の藻塩火焚きそめて
煙は空にくゆりわぶとも

Roma-ji: Nabikaji na ama no moshiobi takisomete keburi wa sora ni kuyuri wabu tomo
English Translation: She will not bend, no—
though like the fishers' salt-fire
I have begun to burn,
and my smoke in the high sky
smolders on in its despair.
Meaning: She will never bend toward me, no. Even though, like fishers who have kindled their salt-making fires, I have begun to burn with love, and my smoke smolders and languishes in the sky.
Commentary: Book Twelve Love Poems II 1082

Headnote: "At the hundred-poem contest held at the house of the Regent and Grand Chancellor."
This is the second poem of the group expressing hidden love through smoke and seaside imagery. The speaker laments that the beloved will not yield, however the smoke of the salt fire may smolder in the sky. According to the headnote, it was composed for the hundred-poem contest held at the house of the Regent and Grand Chancellor, Fujiwara no Yoshitsune.
The author is Fujiwara no Teika; "Ason" in the original name is an honorific for officials of the fifth rank and above. He was the son of Fujiwara no Shunzei and one of the compilers of the Shin Kokinshū.
This contest is the Poetry Contest in Six Hundred Rounds, held by Yoshitsune in Kenkyū 4 (1193). The poem is said to draw on the anonymous Kokinshū poem, "The smoke from the salt fires of the Suma fishers, driven by a fierce wind, has trailed off where none intended."

The first line, "nabikaji na," means "she will not bend," the negative conjectural "ji" joined to the exclamatory "na." The poem breaks after the first line, setting at its head the resignation that the beloved will never turn toward the speaker. The bending of smoke in the wind and the yielding of a heart are layered in one word.
The second line, "ama no moshiobi," is the fire over which fishers pour brine on seaweed to make salt. Taking up the hidden "shitamoe" of the preceding poem, the fire of love is carried over into a seaside image.
The third line, "takisomete," means "having begun to kindle." The kindling of love is laid over the kindling of the salt fire.
The fourth line, "keburi wa sora ni," follows "keburi dani" of the preceding poem in speaking of smoke. There, the smoke vanished without a trace; here it lingers and smolders in the sky, so the same smoke is drawn in contrast.
In the last line, "kuyuri wabu tomo," "kuyuru" is to smolder and "wabu" is to languish in distress, so the pains of love are entrusted to the look of the smoke. "Tomo" is a concessive, "however much it may languish," and through inversion the poem returns to its first line. The smoke that in the source poem trailed off where none intended becomes smoke that refuses to bend and smolders in the sky.
Author: Fujiwara no Teika
Source: Shin Kokin Wakashu
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