吉野山やがて出でじと思ふ身を
花散りなばと人や待つらん
花散りなばと人や待つらん
- Roma-ji
-
Yoshinoyama yagate ideji to omou mi o hana chirinaba to hito ya matsuran
- English Translation
-
On Mount Yoshino,
I mean never to come out,
staying as I am—
"once the blossoms fall," they think,
do they wait for me back home?
- Meaning
- I mean to stay on Mount Yoshino and never come out again—yet do the people back home wait for me, thinking I'll return once the blossoms fall?
- Commentary
-
Book Seventeen Miscellaneous Poems II 1619
Headnote: "Topic unknown."
This is the second poem of the sequence on retreating into the mountains of Yoshino. The poet, who means to stay on Mount Yoshino and never come out, wonders whether the people of the capital are waiting for him, thinking he will return when the blossoms fall. The headnote gives the topic as unknown and records nothing of the circumstances.
The author, "Saigyō Hōshi," was named Satō Norikiyo in lay life. A guard in the service of Retired Emperor Toba, he took holy orders at the age of twenty-three.
The first line, "Yoshinoyama," fixes the place on Mount Yoshino. It takes up "miyoshino no yama," the last line of the preceding poem.
The second line, "yagate ideji to," means "never to come out, just as I am." "Yagate" means "as things are," and "ji" expresses negative intention.
The third line, "omou mi o," means "me, who thinks so."
The fourth line, "hana chirinaba to," means "once the blossoms have fallen." Where the preceding poem denied coming for the blossoms, here the people of the capital assume he went for blossom-viewing.
The last line, "hito ya matsuran," closes the kakari-musubi of "ya" with the attributive form of "ran." Thinking of those waiting for his return, it shows the gap between them and his resolve to leave the world.
- Author
- Saigyō
- Source
- Shin Kokin Wakashu
- Prev Poem
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Hana narade tada shiba no to o sashite omou kokoro no oku mo miyoshino no yama
- Next Poem
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Itoite mo nao itowashiki yo narikeri yoshino no oku no aki no yūgure