白雲のこなたかなたにたち別れ
心を幣と砕く旅かな
心を幣と砕く旅かな
- Roma-ji
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Shirakumo no konata kanata ni tachi wakare kokoro o nusa to kudaku tabi kana
- English Translation
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Like white clouds that rise
and part this way and that,
we go our separate ways;
it is a journey that shreds my heart
like offerings to the gods.
- Meaning
- Like white clouds rising and drifting apart, this way and that, we go our separate ways; on this journey my heart is shredded into pieces, like the paper offerings strewn for the gods of the road.
- Commentary
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Book Eight Parting Poems 379
Headnote: "Composed when a friend was leaving for the eastern provinces"
Parting from a friend bound for the eastern provinces, the poet says that the two are separated as white clouds drift apart, and his heart is shredded like the nusa offered to pray for a safe journey. By drawing on the travel custom of nusa as a metaphor, he gives concrete shape to the sorrow of parting.
The author, "Yoshimine no Hideoka," is a figure whose life is not well known.
The first line, "white clouds," leads to tachi in the third line and presents a scene of sky stretching far away. It shares "white clouds" with poems 371 and 380 in this book.
The second line, "this way and that," shows the division between the one who stays in the capital and the one who departs.
The third line, "rise and part," is a pivot word joining the rising of clouds with setting out on a journey, and shares the word "departing" with the first line of the opening poem, 365.
The fourth line, "my heart as offerings," likens the shattered heart to nusa, cloth or paper cut into small pieces to offer to the gods of the road along a journey.
The last line, "a journey that shreds," ends with the exclamatory kana, lamenting a journey on which the heart is torn to pieces in sending the friend off.
- Author
- Yoshimine no Hideoka
- Source
- Kokin Wakashu
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