吹きまよふ野風を寒み秋萩の
移りもゆくか人の心の
移りもゆくか人の心の
- Roma-ji
-
Fukimayou nokaze o samumi akihagi no utsuri mo yuku ka hito no kokoro no
- English Translation
-
Wandering, the wind
blows so cold across the fields,
that the autumn bush clover
fades and changes; so too, it seems,
changes the heart of my love
- Meaning
- Because the wandering wind across the fields is cold, the autumn bush clover fades and changes, and so too, it seems, does the heart of the one I love.
- Commentary
-
Book Fifteen Love Poems V 781
Headnote: "Topic unknown."
As the autumn bush clover fades in the cold wind blowing wildly over the fields, so the lover's heart seems to be changing. The autumn landscape becomes a metaphor for the change of heart, and the inverted last line sharpens the turn from scene to feeling. Here begins a run of poems that set changes of heart against autumn imagery.
The author, "Prince of Urin'in," is Prince Tsuneyasu, a son of Emperor Ninmyō. After the emperor's death he became a monk and lived at the Urin'in temple in Murasakino, hence the name.
The first line, "blowing astray," describes a wind without fixed direction, hinting at an unsettled heart.
In the second line the o ... mi construction gives the cause: because the field wind is cold.
The third line names autumn bush clover, sung of as scattered and faded by wind.
In the fourth line utsuri means both fading color and a change of heart, and ka is a questioning and exclamatory particle.
The last line places the subject of the fourth line at the end by inversion, shifting focus from the clover to the human heart.
- Author
- Prince Tsuneyasu
- Source
- Kokin Wakashu
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Miwa no yama ika ni machimimu toshi fu tomo tazunuru hito mo araji to omoeba
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Ima wa tote waga mi shigure ni furinureba kotonoha sae ni utsuroinikeri