Fuku kaze ni tsukete mo towamu sasagani no kayoishi michi wa sora ni tayu tomo - Shin Kokin Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

吹く風につけても問はむささがにの
通ひし道は空に絶ゆとも

Roma-ji: Fuku kaze ni tsukete mo towamu sasagani no kayoishi michi wa sora ni tayu tomo
English Translation: On the blowing wind
I will send and ask of you,
though the spider's thread,
the path by which you came to me,
should break off in empty sky.
Meaning: I will send word to you even on the blowing wind, though the path you once traveled to me, like a spider's thread, should break off in midair.
Commentary: Book Fourteen Love Poems IV 1242

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Topic unknown."
This is the second poem of the sequence lamenting estrangement through images of autumn and winter. Even if the path you traveled, like a spider's thread, breaks off in the sky, the speaker says, I will send word on the blowing wind. As with the preceding poem, the headnote gives no topic, and the circumstances are not recorded.
The author, "Mother of Michitsuna, the Right Commander," is the Mother of Fujiwara no Michitsuna. A daughter of Fujiwara no Tomoyasu, she became a wife of Fujiwara no Kaneie and bore Michitsuna, later Commander of the Right Palace Guards. She is the author of The Kagerō Diary.

The first line, "fuku kaze ni," names the wind as a means of carrying a message. Following the rain of the preceding poem, feeling is again expressed through nature.
The second line, "tsukete mo towamu," means "I will send word, even entrusting it to the wind." "Mu" expresses intention.
In the third line, "sasagani no," "sasagani" is the spider, whose thread is likened to "the path you traveled" in the fourth line. A spider spinning its web was thought to foretell a lover's visit, as in the well-known poem attributed to Princess Sotoori, "This is the evening my beloved is to come: the spider's busy movements show it in advance."
The fourth line, "kayoishi michi wa," means "the path you traveled." The past-tense "shi" shows that the visits already belong to the past.
The last line, "sora ni tayu tomo," is a concessive supposition: "even should it break off in the sky." The snapping of a spider's thread in midair is overlaid on the broken relationship, and the poem ends with her resolve to send word herself nonetheless.
Author: The Mother of Fujiwara no Michitsuna
Source: Shin Kokin Wakashu
Prev Poem: Koto no ha no utsurou dani mo aru mono o itodo shigure no furimasaruramu
Next Poem: Kuzu no ha ni aranu wagami mo akikaze no fuku ni tsuketsutsu uramitsuru kana