Okite inaba imo koimu kamo shikitae no kurokami shikite nagaki kono yo o

置きていなば妹恋ひむかも敷栲の
黒髪敷きて長きこの夜を

Roma-ji: Okite inaba imo koimu kamo shikitae no kurokami shikite nagaki kono yo o
English Translation: If I leave you here,
will you long for me, my love,
on the spread bedclothes,
your black hair spread out beneath you,
through this long and endless night
Meaning: If I go and leave you behind, will you long for me, my love, lying alone with your black hair spread upon the bedding through this long night?
Commentary: Book Four Love Poems 493

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Four poems from the time Tanabe no Imiki Ichihiko was appointed to the Dazaifu"
Placed as if in answer to the preceding plea, this is the departing Tanabe no Ichihiko's own poem. He imagines that if he leaves, his wife will long for him through the long night, sleeping alone with her black hair spread upon the bedding. Opening "if I leave you" in response to "how can you go leaving me," it shows the man and woman exchanging words of sorrow at parting.
At the end of the original text a small note gives the name "Tanabe no Imiki Ichihiko," identifying the author of this poem.
The author, Tanabe no Ichihiko, was an official of the early Nara period who went down to Tsukushi as an officer of the Dazaifu. Imiki is his hereditary title.

First line, "If I leave you here," means if I go and leave you behind; inu means to depart, and -ba after the irrealis marks a supposition. With an extra syllable, it takes up the verb oku from the close of the preceding poem.
Second line, "will you long for me, my love," uses the conjectural mu and the questioning, exclamatory kamo, imagining the heart of the wife left behind. The poem breaks after this line.
Third line, "on the spread bedclothes," is a pillow word from spreading bedding cloth, attached to words such as pillow and bed. Here it calls up the bed where she sleeps with her hair spread out and echoes "spread" in the fourth line.
Fourth line, "your black hair spread out beneath you," pictures long black hair spread over the bed, a concrete image of sleeping alone.
Fifth line, "through this long and endless night," names a long night and also suggests the long stretch of time after parting. By inversion it returns to the second line and closes by naming the time of longing.
Author: Tanabe no Ichihiko
Source: Manyoshu
Prev Poem: Koromode ni toritodokōri naku ko ni mo masareru ware o okite ika ni semu
Next Poem: Wagimoko o ai shirashimeshi hito o koso koi no masareba urameshimi omoe