Yūgure ni inochi kaketaru kagerō no ari ya arazu ya tou mo hakanashi - Shin Kokin Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

夕暮れに命かけたるかげろふの
ありやあらずや問ふもはかなし

Roma-ji: Yūgure ni inochi kaketaru kagerō no ari ya arazu ya tou mo hakanashi
English Translation: Staking all my life
on the dusk, like a mayfly
that lives but one day—
to ask if I'm here or not
is a fleeting thing indeed
Meaning: I am like the mayfly that stakes its whole life on the coming of dusk—how fleeting it is for you to ask whether I am here or not.
Commentary: Book Thirteen Love Poems III 1195

Headnote: "When someone who had promised to come that day asked whether she was at home."
This is the seventh poem of the sequence on waiting for the next evening after a meeting. To ask whether one is there, when one is like a mayfly staking its life on the coming of dusk, is itself a fleeting thing. According to the headnote, it answers a lover who had promised to meet that day and asked whether she was at home.
The author is given as "Anonymous," meaning that the name has not come down to us.

The first line, "yūgure ni," means "on the dusk," the promised evening, taking up "kure ni ya wa aranu" in the preceding poem.
The second line, "inochi kaketaru," means "staking one's life." It is a heart that takes the evening meeting as the limit of life, the same idea as "kure o matsubeki inochi" in 1192 of this book.
The third line, "kagerō no," means "of the mayfly," thought to be born in the morning and to die at evening. As an image of fleeting life, it takes up "staking one's life" in the second line, and the echo of sound between "kaketaru" and "kagerō" resonates as well.
The fourth line, "ari ya arazu ya," means "whether I am here or not." It takes up the question "are you there?" of the headnote, overlaying it with the sense "whether I am alive or not."
The last line, "tou mo hakanashi," means "even to ask is fleeting." It is a reply that asking whether one is there is useless when one can live only until evening, answering the lover's question with the brevity of the mayfly's life.
Author: Unknown Poet
Source: Shin Kokin Wakashu
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