人を思ふ心の木の葉にあらばこそ
風のまにまに散り乱れめ
風のまにまに散り乱れめ
- Roma-ji
-
Hito o omou kokoro no konoha ni araba koso kaze no manimani chiri midareme
- English Translation
-
If this heart of mine
that loves you were but a leaf
upon the branches,
then as the wind might carry it
it would scatter and be lost
- Meaning
- If my heart that loves you were a leaf on a tree, it might scatter and whirl wherever the wind blew. But it is not, and it will not change.
- Commentary
-
Book Fifteen Love Poems V 783
Headnote: "Reply."
A reply to Ono no Komachi's poem, it answers that his heart is not a leaf and so will not scatter and change in the wind. Taking Komachi's kotonoha as "leaves," it denies any change of heart through a hypothetical, a deft turn typical of exchanged poems.
The author, "Ono no Sadaki," is Ono no Sadaki, an official of the Ono clan who, after serving as Junior Secretary of the Crown Prince's Household, rose to the junior fifth rank, upper grade, and served as Governor of Kai and Governor of Higo.
The body text has chiri midareme in the last line, which does not match chiri mo midareme in the reading line. Here the body text is followed.
The first line, "loving you," presents his heart that loves Komachi.
The second line, taking up kotonoha from the preceding poem, compares the heart to a leaf. The line is hypermetric at eight syllables.
In the third line araba koso adds koso to a hypothetical: if it were a leaf. It is resolved by the perfective me in the last line.
The fourth line means "as the wind wills," the wind playing the same leaf-scattering role as the showers in the preceding poem.
In the last line me, the perfective of mu, resolves koso: it might scatter. Left unsaid is the denial that, not being a leaf, it will not.
- Author
- Ono no Sadaki
- Source
- Kokin Wakashu
- Prev Poem
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Ima wa tote waga mi shigure ni furinureba kotonoha sae ni utsuroinikeri
- Next Poem
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Amagumo no yoso ni mo hito no nariyuku ka sasuga ni me ni wa miyuru mono kara