老いらくの来むと知りせば門さして
なしと答へて会はざらましを
なしと答へて会はざらましを
- Roma-ji
-
Oiraku no komu to shiriseba kado sashite nashi to kotaete awazaramashi o
- English Translation
-
Had I but known
that Old Age was on its way,
I'd have barred the gate,
answered, "No one is at home,"
and never let us meet.
- Meaning
- Had I known Old Age was coming to call, I would have barred the gate, answered that no one was at home, and never met it.
- Commentary
-
Book Seventeen Miscellaneous Poems I 895
Headnote: "Topic unknown"
Old age is personified: had the speaker known it was coming, he would have shut the gate, said he was out, and refused to meet it. The wit of treating inescapable age as a caller one could turn away by pretending to be absent makes the lament light. The author is unknown.
A left note says, "These three poems are said to have been composed by three old men of long ago," so the three poems from 893 to 895 are traditionally ascribed to three old men, one each.
First line "oiraku no" is a noun for growing old, personifying age.
Second line "komu to shiriseba" is a counterfactual condition with se, the irrealis of the past ki, plus ba: had I known it would come.
Third line "kado sashite" means barring the gate, treating age as a visitor.
Fourth line "nashi to kotaete" means answering that the master is away.
Fifth line "awazaramashi o" joins the counterfactual mashi and o, regretting "I would have avoided meeting it." It answers the seba of the second line in the seba ... mashi pattern.
- Author
- Unknown Poet
- Source
- Kokin Wakashu
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