Nasakenaku oru hito tsurashi waga yado no aruji wasurenu ume no tachie o - Shin Kokin Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

情けなく折る人つらし我が宿の
あるじ忘れぬ梅の立ち枝を

Roma-ji: Nasakenaku oru hito tsurashi waga yado no aruji wasurenu ume no tachie o
English Translation: Heartless, the one
who breaks it—how bitter!
from my own dwelling
the plum that forgets not its lord,
its tall, reaching branch.
Meaning: How bitter I feel toward the one who heartlessly breaks off the tall branch of the plum at my dwelling, the plum that never forgets its master.
Commentary: Book Nineteen Poems on the Gods 1853

Headnote: "It is said this poem appeared in the dream of a man who went down to Tsukushi around the spring of Kenkyū 2 and broke off a branch of the plum at Anrakuji that night."
This is the second poem in the sequence of poems composed by the gods. It laments the heartlessness of one who breaks off the tall branch of a plum that blooms without forgetting its master. According to the left note, in the spring of Kenkyū 2 (1191) a man who had gone down to Tsukushi broke a branch from the plum at Anrakuji, and the poem appeared in his dream that night. The god himself voices the pain of the broken plum, warning against harming the tree where the god dwells.
The poem has no headnote; a left note follows it instead. In this text the left note is placed under the number of the next poem, but its content shows that it belongs to this poem, so it is cited here as the headnote.
No author is named in the original. Anrakuji was the temple built over the grave of Sugawara no Michizane at Dazaifu in Chikuzen Province, corresponding to today's Dazaifu Tenmangū. The poem is therefore regarded as the utterance of Tenman Tenjin, Michizane worshipped as a god.
"The plum that forgets not its lord" recalls Michizane's poem in the Shūi Wakashū: "Kochi fukaba / nioi okose yo / ume no hana / aruji nashi tote / haru o wasuru na" ("When the east wind blows, send me your fragrance, plum blossoms; though your master is gone, do not forget the spring"). The plum once bidden not to forget the spring appears here as a plum that has not forgotten its master.

The first line, "nasakenaku," means "without compassion."
The second line, "oru hito tsurashi," means "bitter is the one who breaks it," and the poem pauses here. The third line through the last reveal afterward what is being broken, an inverted construction.
In the third line, "waga yado no," "yado" means house or dwelling. The god speaks of Anrakuji, where the plum blooms, as his own home.
The fourth line, "aruji wasurenu," means "that does not forget its master"; "aruji" can be read as Michizane. Where the preceding poem blessed the future of a little pine, this one speaks of a plum faithful to its master, so that poems of pine and plum stand side by side.
The last line, "ume no tachie o," means "the tall branch of the plum." The object of "oru" in the second line is held to the end, leaving the broken branch itself in view.
Author: Tenman Tenjin (per the left note)
Source: Shin Kokin Wakashu
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