Teru tsuki mo kumo no yoso ni zo yukimeguru hana zo kono yo no hikari narikeru - Shin Kokin Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

照る月も雲のよそにぞ行きめぐる
花ぞこの世の光なりける

Roma-ji: Teru tsuki mo kumo no yoso ni zo yukimeguru hana zo kono yo no hikari narikeru
English Translation: Even the bright moon
travels on its circling way
far beyond the clouds;
it is the blossoms that are
the light of this world of ours.
Meaning: Even the shining moon goes circling far off beyond the clouds; it is the blossoms that are the true light of this world.
Commentary: Book Sixteen Miscellaneous Poems I 1468

Headnote: "Among the poems of the hundred-poem sequence at the same house."
This is the eighteenth poem of the sequence on the cherry. Even the shining moon travels far beyond the clouds, the poet says; the blossoms are the light of this world. According to the headnote, it is one of the hundred-poem sequence composed at the same house of the Lay Priest, Former Regent and Chancellor as the preceding poem.
The author, "Master of the Empress Dowager's Household Shunzei," is Fujiwara no Shunzei. He was the son of Fujiwara no Toshitada and the father of Teika. He served as Master of the Empress Dowager's Household and took the tonsure in Angen 2 (1176). He compiled the Senzai Wakashū. No author's name is given in the text; the poem follows the author of the preceding poem.
This hundred-poem sequence, like 1436, the opening poem of this book, refers to the Hundred-Poem Sequences at the Minister of the Right's House, held in Jishō 2 (1178) while Kujō Kanezane was Minister of the Right.

The first line, "teru tsuki mo," presents the shining moon. The particle "mo" implies "even the moon."
In the second line, "kumo no yoso ni zo," "yoso" means a place far removed. The particle "zo" is closed by "meguru" in the third line.
The third line, "yukimeguru," closes the kakari-musubi of the particle "zo" with the attributive form. The moon circles far beyond the clouds, remote from this world, and the poem breaks after the third line.
The fourth line, "hana zo kono yo no," uses the words "kono yo," as in "nao kono yo koso," the second line of the preceding poem. Against the distant moon, it singles out the blossoms as something close at hand in this world.
The last line, "hikari narikeru," closes the kakari-musubi of the particle "zo" with the attributive form "keru." It expresses the sudden realization that it is not the moon, which by nature gives light, but the blossoms that are the light of this world. The upper and lower halves set moon against blossoms, heaven against earth.
Author: Fujiwara no Shunzei
Source: Shin Kokin Wakashu
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