近江より朝立ち来ればうねの野に
鶴ぞ鳴くなる明けぬこの夜は
鶴ぞ鳴くなる明けぬこの夜は
- Roma-ji
-
Ōmi yori asa tachi kureba uneno no ni tazu zo naku naru akenu kono yo wa
- English Translation
-
Setting out from Ōmi
at dawn, I come to the moor
of Uneno, where
the cranes, I hear, are crying:
it has dawned at last, this night.
- Meaning
- Leaving Ōmi at first light, I reach the moor of Uneno and hear the cranes calling. So the night has broken.
- Commentary
-
Book Twenty Poems of the Bureau of Court Song 1071
Headnote: "Court Songs of the Bureau: An Ōmi-buri Song"
Setting out from Ōmi at dawn, the traveler hears cranes crying on the moor and knows the night has ended. Ōmi-buri are folk songs of Ōmi Province, and this one conveys the freshness of an early start in plain words. No author is recorded.
The Ōutadokoro, or Bureau of Court Song, was the office that taught and preserved the ōuta, the songs performed at palace banquets and Shinto rites. Book Twenty of the Kokin Wakashū gathers such songs, arranged as court songs of the Bureau, songs of the kagura, and songs of the East.
The first line, "from Ōmi," marks the starting point of the journey, yori indicating origin.
The second line, "setting out at dawn, I come," means leaving early and traveling on, the particle ba giving a confirmed condition.
The third line, "on the moor of Uneno," names the field where the cranes cry. It is taken as a place in Ōmi, but its location is unknown.
The fourth line, "the cranes are crying," means the calling is heard; naru is the auxiliary of inference from sound. It resolves the binding particle zo in the attributive form. The poem breaks after this line.
The last line, "it has dawned, this night," uses the perfective nu. Inverting "this night has dawned" brings out the surprise of realizing daybreak.
- Source
- Kokin Wakashu
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Shimoto yū kazuraki yama ni furu yuki no ma naku toki naku omōyuru kana
- Next Poem
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Mizuguki no oka no yakata ni imo to are to nete no asake no shimo no furi wa mo