Kekoromo o toki katamakete idemashishi uda no ōno wa omoyemu kamo

けころもを時かたまけて出でましし
宇陀の大野は思ほえむかも

Roma-ji: Kekoromo o toki katamakete idemashishi uda no ōno wa omoyemu kamo
English Translation: The fur-robed season
he awaited, then set out
on the royal hunt—
the broad plain of Uda, how
it will ever come to mind!
Meaning: The wide plain of Uda, where our prince went out to hunt when the season for fur robes came round—how it will always come back to my mind!
Commentary: Book Two Elegies 191

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Twenty-three poems composed in grief by the attendants of the Prince's palace"
Remembering the prince as he was, the speaker says that the wide plain of Uda, where the prince went hunting when the season for fur robes came, will surely always be remembered.
According to the headnote, these are twenty-three poems composed in grief by the attendants who served in Prince Kusakabe's palace. A left note, citing the Nihon shoki, records that the prince died in the fourth month of the third year of Empress Jitō's reign (689). The sequence takes up, scene by scene, the laments of the attendants: the garden and ponds of the Shima Palace bereft of their master, and the night watches they kept on the hills of Mayumi and Sada where the prince lay in state. This is the twenty-first poem of the sequence.
The authors were the attendants who served in Prince Kusakabe's palace, and their individual names have not come down to us. Toneri were officials who served close to the Emperor and members of the imperial family as guards and aides. One theory holds that Kakinomoto no Hitomaro composed the poems in the attendants' voice, but this is not settled.

The first line, "kekoromo o," means "fur robes," leading to the winter season when they were worn. In the original it is written with the characters for spring and winter.
In the second line, "toki katamakete," katamaku means to await a season: waiting for winter to come.
The third line, "idemashishi," means "where he went out," referring to the prince setting out to hunt.
In the fourth line, "uda no ōno wa," the great plain of Uda was a hunting ground in eastern Yamato.
In the final line, "omoyemu kamo," omoyu means to come to mind, mu is conjecture, and kamo exclamatory: it will surely be remembered.
Source: Manyoshu
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