Wakare o ba yama no sakura ni makasetemu tomemu tomeji wa hana no manimani - Kokin Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

別れをば山の桜にまかせてむ
とめむとめじは花のまにまに

Roma-ji: Wakare o ba yama no sakura ni makasetemu tomemu tomeji wa hana no manimani
English Translation: Our parting I shall leave
to the mountain cherries;
let them decide:
to hold you or to let you go
shall rest upon the blossoms.
Meaning: I will leave our parting to the mountain cherries. Whether you are held back or allowed to go shall depend on the blossoms alone.
Commentary: Book Eight Parting Poems 393

Headnote: "Composed when people were parting after having climbed the mountain and come back down"
This poem was composed when people who had climbed Mount Hiei and come back were parting. Leaving the question of parting to the mountain cherries, the poet entrusts the task of holding people back to the blossoms: if they are splendid, people will stay. Showing no clinging attachment, it has the lightness of leaving things to the flowers.
The author, "Priest Yūsen," was a monk of Enryakuji on Mount Hiei.

The first line, "our parting," uses o ba, the particle o voiced with wa, to single out the parting.
The second line, "to the mountain cherries," names the cherries as those to whom the parting is entrusted. The next poems, 394 and 395, also sing of mountain cherries holding people back, forming a group on detaining travelers with blossoms.
The third line, "I shall leave," uses the emphatic te and volitional mu to decide to entrust it, and the poem breaks after this line.
The fourth line, "to hold or not to hold," sets the volitional mu beside the negative volitional ji, presenting in parallel whether to detain or not.
The last line, "shall rest upon the blossoms," means as the blossoms will, ending with the idea that all depends on how the flowers bloom. It shares the word manimani with "following the falling snow" in poem 391 of this book.
Author: Priest Yūsen
Source: Kokin Wakashu
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