Sakurada e tazu nakiwataru Ayuchigata shio hinikerashi tazu nakiwataru

桜田へ鶴鳴き渡る年魚市潟
潮干にけらし鶴鳴き渡る

Roma-ji: Sakurada e tazu nakiwataru Ayuchigata shio hinikerashi tazu nakiwataru
English Translation: Toward Sakurada
cranes are crying as they cross;
Ayuchi's tideflats
must have drained with the ebb tide—
cranes are crying as they cross.
Meaning: Toward Sakurada the cranes fly crying—the tide must be out on the flats of Ayuchi—the cranes fly crying overhead.
Commentary: Book Three Miscellaneous Poems 271

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Eight travel poems by Takechi no Muraji Kurohito"
This is the second of Kurohito's eight travel poems. At Ayuchi Flats in Owari, flocks of cranes fly crying toward the tideflats bared by the ebb, seeking food. By repeating the same line in the second and fifth positions, the poem conveys the unbroken voices and flight of the cranes, and it is famed as a musical landscape poem. Ayuchi Flats lay in the south of present-day Nagoya and are said to be the origin of the name Aichi.
Kurohito's eight travel poems gather pieces composed on journeys through Settsu, Owari, Ōmi, Mikawa, Yamashiro, and other provinces.
The poet, Takechi no Kurohito, was active from the reign of Jitō to that of Monmu. Excelling in travel poems, he opened a distinctive vein of landscape poetry marked by a solitary gaze upon receding things. Little is known of his life.

First line "Toward Sakurada": a place facing Ayuchi Flats, thought to be in today's Minami Ward of Nagoya.
Second line "cranes are crying as they cross" breaks the sentence; the same line returns at the end.
Third line "Ayuchi's tideflats" names the flats of Owari.
Fourth line "must have drained with the ebb tide": kerashi, from keru rashi, expresses a grounded inference, guessing why the cranes are flying.
Fifth line "cranes are crying as they cross" repeats the second line, fixing the image of flock after flock passing over.
Author: Takechi no Kurohito
Source: Manyoshu
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