Shirokane mo kugane mo tama mo nani semu ni masareru takara ko ni shikame ya mo

銀も金も玉も何せむに
まされる宝子にしかめやも

Roma-ji: Shirokane mo kugane mo tama mo nani semu ni masareru takara ko ni shikame ya mo
English Translation: Silver, what of it?
Gold and jewels, what of them?
What use could they be?
Could the finest of treasures
ever match a child of mine?
Meaning: Silver, gold, and jewels, what good are they? What treasure, however fine, could ever compare with a child?
Commentary: Book Five Miscellaneous Poems 803

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "A poem thinking of one's children, with preface: envoy"
The poem declares that silver, gold, and jewels cannot equal the treasure of a child. It is widely known as the most direct expression of a parent's love for a child and is one of Okura's best-known poems.
The preface says that the Buddha taught that he cared for all beings as for his own son Rāhula, and also that no love surpasses love for a child. If even the supreme sage had a heart that loved his child, how could any ordinary person not love theirs? This envoy follows the long poem in which eating melons brings the children to mind, and eating chestnuts makes him long for them still more. The left note says it was composed in Kama District on the twenty-first day of the seventh month of Jinki 5.
The poet, Yamanoue no Okura, was an official who went to Tang China as a junior secretary with the embassy appointed in Taihō 1. After his return he served as Governor of Hōki and in the household of the Crown Prince, and late in the Jinki era he was posted to Tsukushi as Governor of Chikuzen. He is known for poems rooted in everyday life, on the sufferings of human existence, love for family, and poverty, written against a background of learning in Chinese classics and Buddhist scripture.

First line, "shirokane mo": "shirokane" is silver, beginning a list of the world's treasures.
Second line, "kugane mo tama mo": gold ("kugane") and jewels ("tama") are added, with "mo" repeated three times to parade the world's riches.
Third line, "nani semu ni": a rhetorical question, "what use are they?" The poem breaks after this third line.
Fourth line, "masareru takara": a treasure surpassing those, implying "however fine a treasure."
Fifth line, "ko ni shikame ya mo": "shiku" means to equal, and "me ya mo" is rhetorical: could anything match a child? No, never.
Author: Yamanoue no Okura
Source: Manyoshu
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