Saoshika no nakunaru yama o koeyukamu hi dani ya kimi ga hata awazaramu

さを鹿の鳴くなる山を越え行かむ
日だにや君がはた逢はざらむ

Roma-ji: Saoshika no nakunaru yama o koeyukamu hi dani ya kimi ga hata awazaramu
English Translation: Where the stag's voice cries,
that mountain I must cross over—
on the day I go,
even then, my love, will you
still refuse to meet with me?
Meaning: Even on the day I cross the mountain where the stag is heard crying, will you still refuse to meet me, my love?
Commentary: Book Six Miscellaneous Poems 953

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Four poems composed when the Emperor made a progress to the palace at Naniwa in the fifth year, the year of the Earth Dragon"
This poem laments whether the beloved will still refuse to meet even on the day the poet sets out across the mountain where the stag cries. According to the headnote, this is one of four poems composed when Emperor Shōmu made a progress to the palace at Naniwa in Jinki 5 (728). None of the four is a poem praising the progress; all of them entrust feelings of love to mountains, jewels, pines and the like.
The lament that the lovers cannot meet even on so special a day as a departure is steeped in the pain of a love that can rarely be fulfilled. Where the first three of the four poems entrust the longing for the beloved to a mountain, a jewel and a pine, this one closes by addressing the beloved directly, bringing the sequence to an end.
The left note reads, "The above poems appear among the poems of Kasa no Asomi Kanamura. Some say they were composed by Kurumamochi no Asomi Chitose." They were included in Kasa no Kanamura's collection, but there is also a tradition attributing them to Kurumamochi no Chitose, so the author remains undetermined. Both Kasa no Kanamura and Kurumamochi no Chitose were court poets who accompanied the sovereigns on their progresses from the reign of Empress Genshō to that of Emperor Shōmu.

In the first line, "Where the stag's voice cries," "sa-" is a prefix and the word means a stag. The deer that cries for its mate in autumn is often sung as something that stirs thoughts of love, and here too it sets longing for the beloved in the background.
In the second line, "that mountain I must cross over," "naru" is an auxiliary that infers from sound, meaning the mountain where the stag can be heard crying.
The third line, "on the day I go," means "that I shall cross," picturing the day when the poet will cross the mountain and set out.
In the fourth line, "even then, my love, will you," "dani" is an adverbial particle meaning "at least," showing the feeling that on the day of departure, at least, they ought to meet. "Ya" is an interrogative binding particle concluded by "-zaramu" in the final line.
In the final line, "still refuse to meet with me?" "hata" means "even so," and, answering the "ya" of the fourth line, the poem ends in the lament "will you not meet me after all?"
Source: Manyoshu
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