時しもあれ秋やは人の別るべき
あるを見るだに恋しきものを
あるを見るだに恋しきものを
- Roma-ji
-
Toki shimo are aki ya wa hito no wakaru beki aru o miru dani koishiki mono o
- English Translation
-
Of all the seasons,
should it be in autumn that
one must part from us?
Even seeing those who live
fills this season with longing.
- Meaning
- Of all times, must a person part from us in autumn? Even when I see those still living, it is the season that fills me with longing.
- Commentary
-
Book Sixteen Poems of Lament 839
Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Composed when Ki no Tomonori passed away"
Following the preceding poem, this one mourns the death of Ki no Tomonori. The poet laments that, of all times, the parting should come in autumn, when one longs for others even without cause. The loneliness of the season and the grief of death overlap to deepen his feeling for the friend who died in autumn.
The author, Mibu no Tadamine, served with Tomonori as a compiler of the Kokinshū. He is one of the Thirty-Six Immortals of Poetry.
The first line, "of all times," uses the emphatic shimo to mean "of all the times there might be."
The second line, "in autumn should one," uses the rhetorical particle yawa.
The third line, "part from us," closes in the attributive beki after yawa: "Should one part? Surely not." The poem breaks here. Where the preceding poem limited grief to "today," this poem lays it upon the season of autumn.
The fourth line, "even seeing the living," uses dani to name a lighter case and imply a heavier one.
The last line, "stirs longing," ends with the concessive exclamation mono o, leaving a lingering sense.
- Author
- Mibu no Tadamine
- Source
- Kokin Wakashu
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Asu shiranu waga mi to omoedo kurenu ma no kyō wa hito koso kanashikarikere
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Kannazuki shigure ni nururu momijiba wa tada wabibito no tamoto narikeri