隈もなき折しも人を思ひ出でて
心と月をやつしつるかな
心と月をやつしつるかな
- Roma-ji
-
Kuma mo naki orishimo hito o omoiidete kokoro to tsuki o yatsushitsuru kana
- English Translation
-
Just when not a cloud
shadowed the moon, that one came
back into my mind,
and my own heart, through my tears,
has made the moon look worn and wan.
- Meaning
- Just when the moon shone without a single shadow, I remembered that person, and by my own heart's doing I dimmed the moon with tears, leaving it haggard.
- Commentary
-
Book Fourteen Love Poems IV 1268
Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Topic unknown."
This is the thirteenth poem of the sequence of love poems on the moon. Just when the moon was cloudless, the speaker remembered that person, and by his own heart's doing wore the moon down with tears. As with the preceding poem, the headnote gives no topic, and the circumstances are not recorded.
No author is named in the original; continuing from the preceding poem, it is by Saigyō. His lay name was Satō Norikiyo; he served as a guard of the north quarter under Retired Emperor Toba, took holy orders at twenty-three, and traveled the provinces composing poetry.
The first line, "kuma mo naki," means "without any cloud or shadow," describing a perfectly clear moon.
In the second line, "orishimo hito o," "orishimo" means "just at that moment." It shows the ironic chance of remembering the beloved precisely when the moon is at its most beautiful.
The third line, "omoiidete," takes up "omoi mo ideba" in the fourth line of the preceding poem. There he hoped the other would remember; here it is he himself who remembers.
In the fourth line, "kokoro to tsuki o," "kokoro to" means "of my own heart's doing." The moon did not cloud over; his own heart clouded it.
In the last line, "yatsushitsuru kana," "yatsusu" means "to make shabby, reduce in appearance." He regards the moon blurred by tears as something he himself has worn down, setting it against "kuma mo naki" in the first line.
- Author
- Saigyō
- Source
- Shin Kokin Wakashu
- Prev Poem
-
Tsuki nomi ya uwa no sora naru katami nite omoi mo ideba kokoro kayowamu
- Next Poem
-
Mono omoite nagamuru koro no tsuki no iro ni ikabakari naru aware somuramu