皆人の命も我れもみ吉野の
滝の常磐の常ならぬかも
滝の常磐の常ならぬかも
- Roma-ji
-
Minahito no inochi mo ware mo miyoshino no taki no tokiwa no tsune naranu kamo
- English Translation
-
Of all people,
their lives, and mine as well—
in fair Yoshino,
like the everlasting rocks of the rapids,
might they not stay unchanging
- Meaning
- The lives of all people, and my own life too—might they not stay forever unchanging, like the everlasting rocks amid the rapids of fair Yoshino?
- Commentary
-
Book Six Miscellaneous Poems 922
Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Two envoys"
This poem wishes that the lives of all people, and the poet's own, might endure unchanged forever like the rocks in the rapids of fair Yoshino. By praying for long life for the courtiers of the progress and for the poet himself, it celebrates the lasting continuation of the progresses to the palace at Yoshino.
The long poem immediately before (920) is titled "A poem composed by Kasa no Asomi Kanamura when the Emperor made a progress to the detached palace at Yoshino in the fifth month of summer in the second year of Jinki," and was written while accompanying Emperor Shōmu on his progress to Yoshino in the fifth month of Jinki 2 (725). The long poem praises the scene of plovers and river frogs calling over the clear shallows of the Yoshino River, and closes by praying to the gods of heaven and earth that the place may flourish "thus for ten thousand ages."
For the first line, some texts write "hito mina" (people all), but following the Genryaku text and the Ruijū Koshū, which have "mina hito" (all people), it is read "Minahito no."
The poet, Kasa no Kanamura, was a court poet of the early Nara period who accompanied the sovereigns from Empress Genshō to Emperor Shōmu on their progresses and left many poems of praise. Together with Yamabe no Akahito, he is regarded as a representative poet of the age.
Where the preceding poem, 921, praised the eternity of the land with "for ten thousand ages could one ever tire of it," this poem prays for the eternity of human life, so the two envoys express the permanence of both the land and its people.
The first line, "Of all people," means everyone, and seems to refer to the courtiers accompanying the progress.
The second line, "their lives, and mine as well," means the lives of others and the poet's own, and by repeating the particle "mo" it sets the people around the poet side by side with the poet.
In the third line, "in fair Yoshino," the prefix "mi-" is an honorific that speaks of Yoshino with reverence.
The fourth line, "like the everlasting rocks of the rapids," uses "no" as a comparison, meaning "like." "Tokiwa" means rocks that never change, a symbol of the eternal and unchanging.
The final line, "might they not stay unchanging," means "would that they might last forever," the negative "nu" combined with "kamo" expressing a wish. The echo between "tokiwa" in the fourth line and "tsune" (constant) strengthens the wish for permanence.
- Author
- Kasa no Kanamura
- Source
- Manyoshu
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Yorozuyo ni mitomo akame ya miyoshino no tagitsu kōchi no ōmiyadokoro
- Next Poem
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Miyoshino no kisayama no ma no konure ni wa kokoda mo sawaku tori no koe kamo