Yama fukaku toshi furu ware mo aru mono o izuchi ka tsuki no idete yuku ran - Shin Kokin Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

山深く年ふる我もあるものを
いづちか月の出でてゆくらん

Roma-ji: Yama fukaku toshi furu ware mo aru mono o izuchi ka tsuki no idete yuku ran
English Translation: Deep in the mountains
there is one who has passed years—
I, too, am here, yet
whither, then, is the moon bound,
rising up and going forth?
Meaning: Though I, too, have dwelt for years deep in these mountains, where can the moon be going as it rises and departs?
Commentary: Book Twenty Buddhist Poems 1918

Headnote: "A poem that appeared in a dream at dawn when Chien Shōnin, having made a pilgrimage to Daisen in Hōki, was about to leave."
This is the third poem in the opening sequence of poems attributed to deities and eminent monks. It likens the holy man about to leave the mountain to the moon, lamenting: though there is one who has dwelt deep in these mountains for many years, where is the moon going? According to the headnote, it appeared in a dream at dawn as Chien Shōnin, after a pilgrimage to Daisen in Hōki, was about to leave. In this text the headnote begins with "These two poems are handed down as the poems of the Kiyomizu Kannon," but that is the left-hand note to the two preceding poems.
It is spoken from the standpoint of one who lives in the mountain and is understood as a poem by the deity or buddha enshrined at Daisen. One can read in it the wish to hold the holy man back and show the merit of staying on the mountain.
No author is named in the text. Chien Shōnin is a monk of whom little is known; shōnin is an honorific for a monk of great virtue.
Daisen is a mountain rising in Hōki Province, present-day Tottori Prefecture, long known as a sacred site of mountain worship, where Daisen-ji temple was established.

The first line, "yama fukaku," conveys the depth of Daisen and leads into the long years of the one who lives there.
In the second line, "toshi furu ware mo," "ware" is the one who has lived long in the mountains, understood as the deity or buddha of the mountain. As with "waga yo no naka ni" in the book's opening poem, a sacred being declares its own presence.
The third line, "aru mono o," is adversative through the particle "mono o": "though I am here."
The fourth line, "izuchi ka tsuki no," asks "where" with the particle "ka." The moon stands for Chien Shōnin, about to leave the mountain.
The last line, "idete yuku ran," closes the kakari-musubi of "ka" with the attributive "ran." The scene of the moon rising from the mountain rim is overlaid with the holy man departing the mountain.
Source: Shin Kokin Wakashu
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