難波潟潮干なありそね沈みにし
妹が姿を見まく苦しも
妹が姿を見まく苦しも
- Roma-ji
-
Naniwagata shiohi na ari so ne shizuminishi imo ga sugata o mimaku kurushi mo
- English Translation
-
O Naniwa bay,
let your tide not ebb away—
for it pains me so
to see the form of the maid
who has sunk beneath your waves.
- Meaning
- O Naniwa bay, do not let your tide go out, for it pains me to see the form of the maiden who sank beneath your waters.
- Commentary
-
Book Two Elegies 229
Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Two poems composed in grief by Kawabe no Miyahito on seeing the body of a maiden in the pine grove of Himeshima in the fourth year of Wadō, the year kanoto-i"
If the tide ebbs at Naniwa bay, the body of the drowned maiden will be revealed, and since it pains him to see it, he begs the tide not to go out.
A section heading reads "the Nara Palace," and from here the poems belong to the age of the Nara capital. According to the headnote, these are two poems Kawabe no Miyahito composed in grief in the fourth year of Wadō (711) on seeing the body of a young woman in the pine grove of Himeshima in Settsu. This is the second, and its authorship follows the headnote of the pair.
The author, Kawabe no Miyahito, is otherwise unknown.
The first line, "naniwagata," means the tidal flats of the sea at Naniwa.
In the second line, "shiohi na ari so ne," na ... so ne is a prohibition with an added wish: please let the tide not ebb. The poem pauses here.
In the third line, "shizuminishi," ni is perfective and shi the attributive of the past ki: who has sunk.
The fourth line, "imo ga sugata o," means "the maiden's form."
In the final line, "mimaku kurushi mo," mimaku is the nominalized form of mimu and mo is exclamatory: it is painful to see.
- Author
- Kawabe no Miyahito
- Source
- Manyoshu
- Prev Poem
-
Imo ga na wa chiyo ni nagaremu himeshima no komatsu ga ure ni koke musu made ni
- Next Poem
-
Takamato no nobe no akihagi itazura ni saki ka chiruramu miru hito nashi ni