Furusato no yado moru tsuki ni koto towan ware o ba shiru ya mukashi sumiki to - Shin Kokin Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

ふるさとのやどもる月に言問はん
我をば知るや昔住みきと

Roma-ji: Furusato no yado moru tsuki ni koto towan ware o ba shiru ya mukashi sumiki to
English Translation: I shall ask the moon
that guards my old home, seeping in
through its broken roof:
'Do you know me? I am one
who used to live here long ago.'
Meaning: I will speak to the moon that keeps my old home, seeping through its roof: "Do you know me? I once lived here long ago."
Commentary: Book Sixteen Miscellaneous Poems I 1551

Headnote: "On 'The Moon at One's Old Home.'"
This is the second poem of the sequence on the moon that recalls the past. The poet resolves to ask the moon that guards his ruined old home and seeps into it whether it knows him, one who lived there long ago. According to the headnote, it was composed on the topic "The Moon at One's Old Home."
The author, "Jakuchō Hōshi," had the lay name Fujiwara no Tametsune. The son of Fujiwara no Tametada, he took the tonsure together with his brothers Jakunen and Jakuzen and lived at Ōhara. He was the father of Fujiwara no Takanobu.
"The Moon at One's Old Home" is a topic on the moon seen at a place where one once lived.

The first line, "furusato no," refers to a place where one once lived, an old house.
In the second line, "yado moru tsuki ni," "yado moru" plays on "moru," to guard the house, and "moru," for moonlight to leak into a ruined house. It overlays the moon alone keeping a house where no one lives with its light leaking through the roof.
The third line, "koto towan," uses the volitional "n," meaning "I shall ask," and the poem breaks after the third line.
The fourth line, "ware o ba shiru ya," means "do you know me?" Taking up the tales of the past in the preceding poem, he questions the moon as one who knows the past.
The last line, "mukashi sumiki to," uses the past "ki," meaning "that I lived here long ago." Placing the content of the question last in inverted order, it contrasts the unchanging moon with his own changed self.
Author: Jakuchō
Source: Shin Kokin Wakashu
Prev Poem: Ayashiku zo kaesa wa tsuki no kumorinishi mukashigatari ni yo ya fukeniken
Next Poem: Sudakiken mukashi no hito wa kage taete yado moru mono wa ariake no tsuki