Wakayu tsuru matsura no kawa no kawanami no nami ni shi omowaba ware koime ya mo

若鮎釣る松浦の川の川なみの
並にし思はば我れ恋ひめやも

Roma-ji: Wakayu tsuru matsura no kawa no kawanami no nami ni shi omowaba ware koime ya mo
English Translation: Fishing for young trout
in the river of Matsura,
like its passing waves,
if my love were ordinary,
would I pine for you like this?
Meaning: Like the waves of the Matsura River where we fish for young sweetfish—if my feelings were only ordinary, would I long for you so?
Commentary: Book Five Miscellaneous Poems 858

Headnote: "Three more poems in reply by the girls"
The girls answer that if their feelings were ordinary, they would not long for him so. In reply to the wandering guest's proposal, they convey that their love is deep, showing that they accept it.
The headnote reads "Three more poems in reply by the girls"; they take the form of the girls' answers to the wandering guest's three poems, but they are the work of the tale's author.
This belongs to the sequence that begins with "Preface on an Excursion to the Matsura River." The preface tells how the author, wandering by the pools of Tamashima in Matsura, met some girls fishing whose beauty was like that of immortal maidens; they answered that they were fishermen's children with neither village nor home, yet asked to be joined with him until old age. It is a fictional tale that borrows the conceits of the Chinese romance of the immortals, You xian ku. It is most commonly attributed to Ōtomo no Tabito, though some ascribe it to Yamanoue no Okura.
The poet, Ōtomo no Tabito, was the son of the Major Counselor Ōtomo no Yasumaro and the father of Ōtomo no Yakamochi. Late in the Jinki era he went down to Tsukushi as Governor-General of Dazaifu, returned to the capital in Tenpyō 2 as Major Counselor, and died the following year. Versed in Chinese letters and Daoist thought, he formed a literary circle at Dazaifu with Yamanoue no Okura and others, known as the Tsukushi poetic circle.

First line, "wakayu tsuru": takes up the third line of the wandering guest's poem, beginning the reply from the girls' side.
Second line, "Matsura no kawa no": answers the second line of 857, "Matsura no kawa ni."
Third line, "kawanami no": "river waves," whose sound "nami" leads to the "nami" (ordinary) that follows. The first three lines form a preface.
Fourth line, "nami ni shi omowaba": "nami" means ordinary, a play on the sound of "kawanami."
Fifth line, "ware koime ya mo": "me ya mo" is rhetorical: were my love ordinary, would I yearn like this? No.
Author: Ōtomo no Tabito (attributed)
Source: Manyoshu
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