Kaku shitsutsu yūbe no kumo to narimoseba aware kaketemo tare ka shinobamu - Shin Kokin Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

かくしつつ夕べの雲となりもせば
あはれかけても誰か偲ばむ

Roma-ji: Kaku shitsutsu yūbe no kumo to narimoseba aware kaketemo tare ka shinobamu
English Translation: If, as I am now,
I should turn into the clouds
that drift at evening,
who would there be to remember me,
even with a passing sigh?
Meaning: If I should go on like this and become the evening clouds, who would remember me, even with a word of pity?
Commentary: Book Eighteen Miscellaneous Poems III 1746

Headnote: "When I was ill and in retreat at Uzumasa, feeling forlorn."
A poem thinking of what follows death. If she should become the evening clouds like this, would anyone remember her with pity? According to the headnote, it was composed when, ill and in retreat at Uzumasa, she felt forlorn. She worries over the loneliness of having no one to remember her after death.
In the original the headnote is preceded by "Because she said this, she was not reprimanded." This is a note continuing the preceding poem, recording that it spared its author, and so it is omitted from this poem's headnote.
The author, "Suō no Naishi," was the daughter of Taira no Munenaka. A lady-in-waiting who served four emperors from Go-Reizei to Horikawa, she was called by this name because her father was Governor of Suō.
Uzumasa is a place in Yamashiro Province, site of the temple Kōryūji, where people went into retreat to pray for recovery from illness and other blessings.

The first line, "kaku shitsutsu," means "going on like this," referring to her present state, ill and in retreat.
The second line, "yūbe no kumo to," refers to the smoke of cremation becoming the evening clouds, and so means death.
The third line, "narimoseba," means "if I should become." "Seba" marks a supposition, imagining her death.
The fourth line, "aware kaketemo," means "even keeping me in mind with pity."
In the last line, "tare ka shinobamu," "ka" is a rhetorical particle closed in kakari-musubi by the attributive form of the conjectural "mu." It means that no one will remember her. The same grief as in 1738 of this book, "it is sad that there is no one to remember me," is voiced here too.
Author: Suo no Naishi
Source: Shin Kokin Wakashu
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