Ikanaramu iwao no uchi ni sumaba ka wa yo no uki koto no kikoe kozaramu - Kokin Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

いかならむ巌の中に住まばかは
世の憂きことの聞こえこざらむ

Roma-ji: Ikanaramu iwao no uchi ni sumaba ka wa yo no uki koto no kikoe kozaramu
English Translation: In what kind of rock,
within what crag must I dwell
if I am to find
that the sorrows of the world
will no longer reach my ears?
Meaning: Inside what sort of crag would I have to live so that the troubles of the world would no longer reach my ears?
Commentary: Book Eighteen Miscellaneous Poems II 952

Headnote: "Topic unknown"
Seeking a place where news of the world's troubles cannot reach, the poet asks what crag one would have to live inside. The question, with a rhetorical edge, carries the lament that there is no escape from the world's sorrows anywhere.
Following the rocky paths of Yoshino in the previous poem, it imagines an even more extreme hiding place inside a crag, deepening the feeling within the sequence of poems about fleeing to the mountains.
The author is recorded as anonymous, and the name has not come down to us.

The first line, "in what kind of," opens the question.
The second line, "within what crag," writes naka, "inside," which the reading line glosses as uchi.
The third line, "must I dwell," uses ka wa, an interrogative with a rhetorical sense, answered by the attributive mu at the end.
The fourth line, "the sorrows of the world," names what the poet wishes to escape.
The last line, "will no longer reach my ears," uses zara (negative) and mu (conjecture), completing the ka wa construction.
Author: Unknown Poet
Source: Kokin Wakashu
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