こよろぎの磯たちならし磯菜摘む
めざし濡らすな沖にをれ波
めざし濡らすな沖にをれ波
- Roma-ji
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Koyorogi no iso tachinarashi isona tsumu mezashi nurasu na oki ni ore nami
- English Translation
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On Koyorogi's
rocky shore, treading to and fro,
picking sea greens,
do not wet the little girl:
stay out at sea, you waves.
- Meaning
- Waves, do not soak the girl who wanders the rocks of Koyorogi picking sea greens; keep yourselves out at sea.
- Commentary
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Book Twenty Poems of the Bureau of Court Song 1094
Headnote: "Songs of the East: Sagami Song"
Caring for the girl gathering seaweed on the rocks, the singer calls on the waves not to wet her and to stay out at sea. Tenderness for a girl at work on the shore takes the simple form of a command to the waves. No author is recorded.
The Azuma-uta, songs of the East, are folk songs of the eastern provinces taken into the court, arranged by province: Michinoku, Sagami, Hitachi, Kai and Ise.
The first line, "of Koyorogi," names a shore in Sagami, thought to be near today's Ōiso Town, Kanagawa.
The second line, "treading the rocky shore," shows the girl walking back and forth over the beach.
The third line, "picking sea greens," repeats iso from the second line.
The fourth line, "do not wet the girl," uses mezashi, a girl's hairstyle with bangs cut at the eyes and by extension the girl herself; na forbids. The poem breaks here.
The last line, "stay out at sea, you waves," personifies the waves with an imperative and a direct address.
- Source
- Kokin Wakashu
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