Obotsukana kasumi tatsuran Takekuma no matsu no kuma moru haru no yo no tsuki - Shin Kokin Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

おぼつかな霞立つらん武隈の
松のくま漏る春の夜の月

Roma-ji: Obotsukana kasumi tatsuran Takekuma no matsu no kuma moru haru no yo no tsuki
English Translation: How I wonder, how—
where the haze must now be rising
at Takekuma,
through the shadows of the pine
the moon of this spring night seeping.
Meaning: How uncertain it is—at Takekuma, where the haze must now be rising, how does the spring night's moon look, seeping through the shadows of the pine?
Commentary: Book Sixteen Miscellaneous Poems I 1475

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "When Tachibana no Tamenaka Ason was in Michinoku, I sent him many poems."
This is the third poem of the sequence on the things of late spring. From afar, the poet imagines the spring night's moon seeping through the shadows of the pine at Takekuma, where the haze must now be rising. The headnote continues from the preceding poem: it is one of many poems sent to Tachibana no Tamenaka while he was in Michinoku.
The author, "Kaga no Saemon," was a lady-in-waiting and poet of the mid-Heian period. No author's name is given in the text; the poem follows the author of the preceding poem.
The Takekuma pine is a famous place in Michinoku, in present-day Iwanuma, Miyagi Prefecture, known as a pine that divides into two trunks from its base.

The first line, "obotsukana," is the stem of the adjective "obotsukanashi," exclaiming "how uncertain" or "how anxious." The poem breaks after the first line.
In the second line, "kasumi tatsuran," "ran" is the present conjectural: "where haze must now be rising." It imagines spring in distant Michinoku.
The third line, "Takekuma no," presents Takekuma, a famous place in Michinoku. Following Sue-no-Matsuyama in the preceding poem, it sings of another famous pine of Michinoku.
In the fourth line, "matsu no kuma moru," "kuma" means a shadowed or hidden place. Echoing the sound "kuma" in "Takekuma" of the third line, it shows moonlight seeping from the shadows of the pine.
The last line, "haru no yo no tsuki," ends on a noun and is the same line as the last line of the preceding poem. Moving from Sue-no-Matsuyama to the Takekuma pine, famous places of Michinoku are laid one upon another, and the shared last line makes the two poems a pair.
Author: Kaga no Saemon
Source: Shin Kokin Wakashu
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