Nani ka omou nani o ka nageku yo no naka wa tada asagao no hana no ue no tsuyu - Shin Kokin Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

何か思ふ何をか嘆く世の中は
ただ朝顔の花の上の露

Roma-ji: Nani ka omou nani o ka nageku yo no naka wa tada asagao no hana no ue no tsuyu
English Translation: What do you brood on?
What is it that you lament?
This world of ours is
nothing but a morning glory,
the dew upon its flower.
Meaning: What troubles you? What do you grieve over? This world is nothing but dew resting on the flower of a morning glory.
Commentary: Book Twenty Buddhist Poems 1917

Headnote: none
This is the second poem in the opening sequence of poems attributed to deities and eminent monks. It speaks to someone who broods and grieves, teaching that the world is as fleeting as dew on a morning glory. There is no headnote; after this poem stands the left-hand note, "These two poems are handed down as the poems of the Kiyomizu Kannon." In this text, that note is written at the head of the next poem's headnote.
By awakening the listener to impermanence, the poem seeks to dissolve the worries born of attachment, and, like the preceding poem, it takes the form of Kannon addressing living beings.
No author is named in the text; according to the left-hand note, the poem is handed down as a poem of the Kiyomizu Kannon, the eleven-headed, thousand-armed Kannon enshrined as the principal image of Kiyomizu-dera in Higashiyama, Kyoto.

The first line, "nani ka omou," closes the kakari-musubi of the particle "ka" with the attributive form "omou," asking what it is that troubles the listener.
The second line, "nani o ka nageku," likewise closes "ka" with the attributive "nageku," forming a parallel with the first line. The repeated questions shake the troubled heart.
The third line, "yo no naka wa," takes up the same word as "waga yo no naka ni" in the preceding poem, presenting the human world as Kannon sees it.
The fourth line, "tada asagao no," names the morning glory, which blooms at dawn and withers by midday, as a figure of transience.
The last line, "hana no ue no tsuyu," sets even more fleeting dew upon the fleeting flower, a double metaphor, and ends on a noun. The impermanence of the world is condensed into a single scene.
Source: Shin Kokin Wakashu
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